Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

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wobuffet
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Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by wobuffet »

LW2's graze mechanic achieves its goals (making damage more granular and less binary and making the AI's low-percentage shots matter more) but can be annoying when it penalizes high-accuracy shots.

This can be fixed without compromising its goals.
Below I outline a way to adjust graze band in a natural, gradual way without penalizing very high-% shots (or rewarding very low-% shots).

Right now, the graze band's size is 10, fixed and not responsive to whether the shot taken is 25% or 85% likely to hit. Graphically:
graze orig.png
graze orig.png (20.98 KiB) Viewed 34408 times
But intuitively, a 20% longshot is much more likely to barely hit a target than a well-aimed 80% attempt is.

My proposed system would look like this:
graze rework.png
graze rework.png (19.33 KiB) Viewed 34408 times
As you can see, a 20% to-hit shot is still 10% likely to hit normally and 20% likely to graze, as in the current system.
But an 80% to-hit shot is now 77% likely to hit normally and only 6% likely to graze (not 70% and 20%).
More accurate = less graze.

The formula for graze band size ("radius", not "diameter") is 15*(chance to miss), capped at 10.
At < 10% to hit, graze is capped at % to hit: e.g., 3% to hit turns into 6% to graze, 0% to normal hit.
For details, see spreadsheet here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... sp=sharing

tl;dr: why not make "Grazed!" less likely to happen at higher accuracies?
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8wayz
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by 8wayz »

When you open the menu during an active campaign there is a Long War 2 sub-menu. There you can find a slider to configure the cap of the graze band. It can go all the way to 0.

Granted, it will be still linear, but if you want high accuracy shots to not be penalized, just drop it down to something like 2 for example.

I am not really convinced to make close off at the higher echelons since it is really easy to stack up aim and/or remove defence from a target.
Antifringe
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by Antifringe »

I'm pretty sure he knows about the config slider. This is a guy who has studied the mechanic enough to be able to start drawing up graphs and proposing formulas, after all. The slider doesn't do what he wants. He doesn't want to turn it off, he wants it to minimize it for high-end shots while retaining its function of boosting low end shots.

My personal proposal is to just turn graze off for flanked/exposed targets. This makes shotguns and swords way, way, way less frustrating to use.
JulianSkies
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by JulianSkies »

wobuffet wrote:But intuitively, a 20% longshot is much more likely to barely hit a target than a well-aimed 80% attempt is.
I just want to comment on this part.
Intuitively, a 20% longshot is not in fact more likely to barely hit a target than a well-aimed 80% attempt is. Actually, intuitively what would happen is that a mechanic would always behave the same way at all times. So a 20% graze band would always be 20%, that makes simple and intuitive sense. When something starts behaving non-linearly it no longer makes intuitive, easy-guess sense and you start needing much better ways of making it show.
mattprice516
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by mattprice516 »

It sort of already is phased out for high-accuracy shots since any accuracy above 100% eats part of the graze band (and 110% removes it entirely).

Additionally, even below 100% the relative chance of a graze vs a hit does actually decrease as accuracy increases. If you have 30% nominal hit chance, half of your shots that connect will graze, whereas only a fifth will graze if you have 90% nominal hit chance. So there's an argument to be made that what you're suggesting is sort of already the case when you look at relative results of shots - even though the absolute percentage stays the same, what that actually means to you practically is much different based on what your nominal hit chance is.

All that said, if you really want it to decrease in the manner you mentioned I would bet it is a pretty moddable thing, though it might require the community highlander or something, I don't recall where exactly the to-hit code was modified. :)
LordYanaek
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by LordYanaek »

My personal idea of how the graze band should work was simple "min" clamping if it ever ends up pushing hit or miss "outside" of the 0-100 range.
Graze-Clamp.png
Graze-Clamp.png (18.75 KiB) Viewed 34214 times
Simple intuitive linear evolution in the 10-90 base THC range (with the default graze band value of 10) and only the extreme points get clamped to avoid 0% shots being able to hit and 100% shots being able to graze (which i find especially silly on immobile structures as they appear to have a fixed 100% THC which means even a 115 aim sharpshooter can still graze those :? )

Continued further :arrow:
Last edited by LordYanaek on Tue May 16, 2017 2:57 pm, edited 3 times in total.
Jadiel
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by Jadiel »

I think the only real reason this bothers people is they believe that a shot where they have either 100% or 0% to hit should never graze. Intuitively, players clamp hit chances at 0% and 100%. People just need to get used to the fact that LW2 instead clamps at -graze% and 100+graze% (so -10% and 110% by default)
LordYanaek
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by LordYanaek »

I posted this quickly while doing something else. I have to say that i've mostly learned to accept the Graze Band as it works now and realized the issue is not the linear unclamped evolution.

I think there is currently 2 real issues with the Graze Band :
  • Immobile structures (relays, gaz tanks...) should be excluded because those don't use Aim at all but rather have a fixed 100% to hit (or at least that's how i understand them). This is the small one.
  • The UI wrongly report 95% Chance to Hit when it's actually 85% Hit / 15% graze. This leads players to feel like the game "eats" some of their chance to hit on high aim shots while actually the progression is just the same. You don't loose more "To Hit" when you go from base 85 to 95, you get +10 to hit and start to loose some graze. You will eventually reach 100% to hit with enough aim, but unfortunately the UI will have reported you had 100% for quite some time at that point. There is a very large difference between seeing 90%Hit/10%Graze and grazing or seeing 100%Hit and grazing. It feels wrong. Actually what's wrong is what the UI told you. This is the big one.
    I think LW2 really needs a shot-bar showing the actual % chance like Perfect Information, but one that actually works with the graze band (unlike PI) because the vanilla UI was never meant to convey that information.
Swiftless
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by Swiftless »

I think the only real reason this bothers people is they believe that a shot where they have either 100% or 0% to hit should never graze. Intuitively, players clamp hit chances at 0% and 100%. People just need to get used to the fact that LW2 instead clamps at -graze% and 100+graze% (so -10% and 110% by default)
The UI wrongly report 95% Chance to Hit when it's actually 85% Hit / 15% graze. This leads players to feel like the game "eats" some of their chance to hit on high aim shots while actually the progression is just the same. You don't loose more "To Hit" when you go from base 85 to 95, you get +10 to hit and start to loose some graze. You will eventually reach 100% to hit with enough aim, but unfortunately the UI will have reported you had 100% for quite some time at that point. There is a very large difference between seeing 90%Hit/10%Graze and grazing or seeing 100%Hit and grazing. It feels wrong. Actually what's wrong is what the UI told you. This is the big one.
I think LW2 really needs a shot-bar showing the actual % chance like Perfect Information, but one that actually works with the graze band (unlike PI) because the vanilla UI was never meant to convey that information.
For me, these are the closest two points to why I despise graze but more than that I turn graze off because the mechanic feels redundant to me. The idea that a weapon already does a random amount of damage between two values, is in essence, a way of implementing the idea of a grazing shot without requiring additional complexity that isn't handled by the base game very well. I'd be fine if the weapons had a wider or even lower min damage range and graze was completely removed.
Jadiel
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by Jadiel »

LordYanaek wrote:I think there is currently 2 real issues with the Graze Band :
  • Immobile structures (relays, gaz tanks...) should be excluded because those don't use Aim at all but rather have a fixed 100% to hit (or at least that's how i understand them). This is the small one.
  • The UI wrongly report 95% Chance to Hit when it's actually 85% Hit / 15% graze. This leads players to feel like the game "eats" some of their chance to hit on high aim shots while actually the progression is just the same. You don't loose more "To Hit" when you go from base 85 to 95, you get +10 to hit and start to loose some graze. You will eventually reach 100% to hit with enough aim, but unfortunately the UI will have reported you had 100% for quite some time at that point. There is a very large difference between seeing 90%Hit/10%Graze and grazing or seeing 100%Hit and grazing. It feels wrong. Actually what's wrong is what the UI told you. This is the big one.
    I think LW2 really needs a shot-bar showing the actual % chance like Perfect Information, but one that actually works with the graze band (unlike PI) because the vanilla UI was never meant to convey that information.
I strongly agree with both of these. Shooting at immobile structures should give you 110% to hit. The second isn't a mechanical problem, just we all learn to automatically convert what the UI tells us is the chance to hit into what it really is. It would be great to get a mod which shows the actual hit/graze/crit percentages though.
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JoeShmo
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by JoeShmo »

Lots of interesting points made, but I think Swift points out the obvious flaw of grazing shots, they already graze natively because of the damage range.

If we were to be realistic here, there's at least two things we would need to take into consideration with grazing shots.

1. What does a 10% chance to hit really mean?

If we were deciding this based on an arc of fire angle ( like with flanking ) a 10% chance to hit would be like someone aiming to the right as they were trying to shoot at something dead ahead of them. A shot like that can realistically never graze.

2. What does it a grazing shot really mean?

If we are talking about a shot that should have hit a target dead on, but instead "missed" by a margin small enough that the impact "grazed" the spot and was moderately deflected, then we need to overhaul the grazing mechanic entirely. A grazing shot would absolutely have to occur based on a shot that was already 100% likely to hit the target to begin with. The damage sustained would then roll based on various factors well beyond the scope of the game itself ( because of reality ), but would better compliment the dodging stat / mechanic, and/or armor strength.


From a vanilla perspective, the damage range already incorporates this sort of a mechanic of "grazing" and/or "alternative hit", as a shot fired by the same gun against the same target should almost always do the exact same structural damage, so having a damage range wouldn't make sense. But for simplicity we use it because we omit things like where the shit hit the body / part of armor..which would influence the damage taken, as well as to what extent the damage caused a wound / outright death. Generally speaking, a weapons damage range is the culmination of these kinds of variables that would affect the outcome of being shot at and/or hit. To start adding those features though is neglecting the purpose of the damage range, along with all the other variables that would then also need to be implemented to properly simulate damage taken.

There for, it is of my opinion that the grazing system, with the lack of backend support to compensate for it, is actually a misguided / mockery of the original system; like if you just gave soldiers ablative shields for no reason, and did nothing to compensate for that extra "health". Or by giving enemy units the option of instant evac during your attack phase instead of dying outright. It may be a logical semantic in whether the enemy unit dies, or simply escapes to fight another day, but there would definitely be a disconnect gameplay / aesthetically.

-------------------------

From a gameplay perspective, I understand ( at least from my perspective ) the point of Grazing, giving players and enemies more consistent damage and less reliance on RNG miss-a-thons ( especially if everyone is under high cover and smoke / etc. ) It's the purpose of weapon attachments that do just that ( which kind of makes grazing again even more redundant and poorly implemented ).

From a "fun" perspective though, it's a real double edged sword..and that deters from it being an actual enjoyable mechanic / experience. I really don't understand, nor like, the idea of low % shots grazing; as I've stated earlier in my comment I believe only high accuracy shots should be able to graze. And then we get into the other part of grazing that isn't fun, having what would be a 6+ damage shot instead turn into a 1 damage shot because it "grazed"; which at this point revolves entirely around how poorly the system is presented to the player via the UI ..and how poorly it seems to be set up in code ( why would you ever need 110% chance to hit to avoid grazing...... ).

I think it's reasonable to say that suggestions provided by others here to make grazing have a different formula / cut off point is a really good start, and ( not quite arguably ) something that should be seriously undertaken. Sure, you can adjust the band yourself in the options, but that comes with another 2 things to note:

1. Turning it off, because it doesn't work right, sounds like a lousy solution for something that is on by default to begin with, and not readily understood by the masses.

2. The "not readily understood" part is really important here, because there is almost zero information given about what grazing does or how the band even works. It's certainly not stated in layman's terms like pretty much most things in the options. It might make sense for "tech savvy" folks...but we don't go around just inserting ini lines of code into the UI instead of the colorful text for a reason.

I personally don't like turning off things that add to the game, it's kinda the entire point of installing a mod to begin with; but that comes with the understanding that the thing being added makes sense..and works like it was designed to. Id really like to enjoy grazing in LW2...but in it's original state...I don't. So in order to enjoy it I have to either turn it off..or alter it to my own preferences; which is perfectly fine in and of itself, but not to enjoy it ( or avoid it ) as a base experience.

-------------

And to avoid commenting without adding at least something to a solution ( my opinion ) to what is perceived as something that needs to change, Id much rather see grazing shots be treated as a second ( or 3rd ) roll, after a successful hit roll has been decided ( like what should happen with crits ). A targets dodge / defense should be a chance to turn a hit into a graze after it is decided it would hit, not beforehand ( and to my understanding, that's not how it currently works ). There doesn't need to be a grazing band at all ( other than for personal modification ).

I never understood why defense would make you harder to hit, especially with having dodge too, which is basically what defense is originally as a design; so it makes no sense to have them both. It would make for a much better stat(s) to turn hits into grazes instead ( again though, after a hit has been confirmed ). This is something that typically "most" rpgs end up doing with a doge / evade / parry mechanic ....providing a chance of reduction in damage instead of outright avoiding it. ( unless you went into complicated ranges ...which for this discussion is again beyond the typical scope of the game ).

Now, ( presuming you are still reading this far down ) before people start saying "but dodge already _____" or "Graze already works like _____" I get it, that's not what I'm getting at; I'm trying to alter it so that it's intuitive, and not just a tacked on mechanic that serves nothing other than as a redundancy in guise of randomization / choice. And as others have stated, something that doesn't punish or benefit those at the far ends of the hitting range. Id like to avoid ( have it removed from ) the hitting range entirely.
LordYanaek
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by LordYanaek »

JoeShmo wrote:Lots of interesting points made, but I think Swift points out the obvious flaw of grazing shots, they already graze natively because of the damage range.
The way i see it the damage range represents the difference between a shot that hits the arm/leg muscle or a shot that hit the body possibly damaging important organs. A crit would be straight between the eyes or in the heart usually killing the target immediately. A graze is a shot that barely scratches the skin with the bullet ending in the wall behind you.
If we were to be realistic here
We can't be realistic otherwise anyone directly hit would be dead. This is one of those situations where gameplay comes before realism.
The damage sustained would then roll based on various factors well beyond the scope of the game itself ( because of reality ), but would better compliment the dodging stat / mechanic, and/or armor strength.
I would love to have the graze band replaced by a "damage band" so that if you roll the minimal value to hit you deal the minimal damage (like a minimal graze) and if you roll the maximum value or better you always deal max damage. Instead of displaying "hit chance" the UI would then display "Chance for max dmg 40%/Chance for min dmg 80%". Crit would also probably be included in this "Damage Band" so that a high Aim score would increase your chances to deal a critical damage (more accuracy = more chance to hit "between the eyes") while Crit score would displace the part of the band reserved to crit, also making crits more likely but without improving your global chance to deal some damage. Dodge would likewise modify the band the other way around.
It seems like the most intuitive way to handle variable damage. That's actually how Pillars of Eternity handles the combat.

However, implementing something like this into XCOM2 would be a huge task as it would require rewriting the to-hit and damage code, completely change the UI in proportions way larger than what the Graze Band needs and especially re-balance every stat from the ground up! I don't think the benefit is worth the cost of doing this now (as opposed to early in the development).
From a "fun" perspective though, it's a real double edged sword..and that deters from it being an actual enjoyable mechanic / experience. I really don't understand, nor like, the idea of low % shots grazing; as I've stated earlier in my comment I believe only high accuracy shots should be able to graze.
Why not? A low% shot represents shooting at someone who's hard to hit either because he's well hidden behind some cover or especially agile. Such a shot probably have a high chance to only graze if it doesn't miss outright. That's actually what happens. A 30% (base) shot with 10 graze band becomes a 20%hit/20%graze/60%miss. That means half of your "hits" will be grazes with such a shot. On the other hand, a shot at a target you can clearly see in the open is more likely to actually connect than barely graze. With 60%hit/20%graze only 1/4th of your hits will be grazes.
..and how poorly it seems to be set up in code ( why would you ever need 110% chance to hit to avoid grazing...... ).
There isn't anything "poor" in the code, it's purely the UI. You don't need a 110% chance to hit to avoid grazing, you need a 100% chance to hit! Unfortunately the UI wrongly reports a 90%hit/10%graze as a 100% hit. The UI is the only real issue.
I personally don't like turning off things that add to the game, it's kinda the entire point of installing a mod to begin with; but that comes with the understanding that the thing being added makes sense..and works like it was designed to. Id really like to enjoy grazing in LW2...but in it's original state...I don't. So in order to enjoy it I have to either turn it off..or alter it to my own preferences; which is perfectly fine in and of itself, but not to enjoy it ( or avoid it ) as a base experience.
Well, LW2 adds enough to the game that i don't think turning off the graze band will remove anything to the experience. Maybe it should be off by default like Red Fog, but then maybe NCE should also be off. There is no reason to stick to what the developers enabled by default. If they wanted us to play with Graze Band always on, they wouldn't have coded a menu option for it. If you don't like an option, change it so you enjoy the game, that's what options are for. I go even further as i also consider some ini edits as options (like showing AWC perks before you can train them) :)
A targets dodge / defense should be a chance to turn a hit into a graze after it is decided it would hit, not beforehand ( and to my understanding, that's not how it currently works )
<...>
Now, ( presuming you are still reading this far down ) before people start saying "but dodge already _____"
Huh, not sure i understand you for that last part. I must say that "dodge already" works this way, because it does. Graze band is different but dodge is calculated after To Hit and will "demote" the hit by one step (crit→hit/hit→graze/graze→miss). That's why dodge is different from defense because defense makes you harder to hit while dodge reduces the damage you take and that's why they both exist. That's also why dodge is different from the graze band even though both can lead to "grazes".
Note that from a pure coding PoV, it's not calculated after the roll but included in the roll (1 roll = faster processing) but from a statistical PoV it is similar to a second roll because dodge and crit affects the miss-graze-hit-crit chances multiplicatively. It would be possible to code 3 real different rolls instead of one and the end result would be the exact same probabilities so merging the rolls only saves processor cycles and doesn't change the result.
Jadiel
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by Jadiel »

I think you'll struggle to get any traction with changing the underlying mechanics because a) it's a lot of work and b) every suggestion I've seen is actually mathematically equivalent to what the game does anyway, allowing for scalar adjustments. So every suggestion basically boils down to roll a dice and you do more damage if you roll high which incrementally drops down to 0 damage if you roll low. So for example, in LW2 with default graze band at the moment, suppose you take a shot with a ballistic Assault Rifle (3-5 damage) and (according to the UI) 60% CTH, 12%CTC and 25% Dodge. Without looking at the code box below (I really wanted a spoiler, but this forum doesn't have one?), take a quick gut feeling guess at what the damage distribution looks like (without doing any calculations):

Code: Select all

7 damage 2.5% of the time
6 damage 2.5% of the time
5 damage 14.33% of the time
4 damage 11.83% of the time
3 damage 19.5% of the time
2 damage 15.33% of the time
0 damage (i.e. you miss) 34% of the time
Maybe someone needs to write a mod which just displays this information to you, and people might get less upset about grazes. In LW1 there was a similar mechanic called Damage Roulette, which was generally disliked, but it's basically the same idea, mathematically.

Is there anything wrong with the above damage distribution, mechanically? I don't think so. The problem is that you were probably pretty far out in guessing the distribution from the information the UI gives you (I know I was), or that you didn't even bother thinking about it, and just looked at the code box (that means you probably hit the button in the game without thinking too much about it either). If someone wrote a mod with an elegant hit bar which divided the chance into each of the above outcomes, maybe all the graze complaints (including those from your favourite LW2 streamer/youtuber) would go away?
Bill365
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by Bill365 »

I certainly don't grock the mechanics of the game as deeply as you guys do, but what would seem to make sense to me is if the mathematics of a to-hit calculation goes ABOVE 100% or BELOW 0% then the extra should be trimmed off the chance to graze.

It's sort of like if a shot has exactly 100% to hit, then maybe the target flinched at the wrong time and the shot might graze. But if the chance to hit is actually 120%, then a flinch wouldn't matter. If the chance to hit is exactly 0%, then maybe a clean shot is impossible, but a bit of shoulder might be exposed and winged by a lucky shot. But if the chance is negative 20, then there's just no exposure as a target at all.

Just an idea.
LordYanaek
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by LordYanaek »

Bill365 wrote:I certainly don't grock the mechanics of the game as deeply as you guys do, but what would seem to make sense to me is if the mathematics of a to-hit calculation goes ABOVE 100% or BELOW 0% then the extra should be trimmed off the chance to graze.
That's exactly how it works but people don't realize it because they (and the UI) clamp THC to a 0-100 scale.

All it would take for people to accept the graze band would be to have an UI that can handle it. Unfortunately Ui coding is often the hardest part of coding.
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JoeShmo
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by JoeShmo »

@Lord

It comes down to a difference of opinion on how the mechanic should work between you and me, and that's fine. Objectively though, the problem with grazing ( and to hit in general ) is that its way too ambiguous, as I pointed out, which is why I kinda wished you would have quoted more of my post that added context to the parts that you did quote.

What does a 10% hit mean? That's an important subject to define before we can even have the debate on whether it's working like it should, or why it works the way it does. Realistically ( and gameplay mechanically ), a "hit' is just that ...making contact, regardless of whether you hit your intended spot or not ( this is where ambiguity comes into play ).....

@Lord, Jadiel. .....A grazing shot, therefore, can never happen unless there is a hit, which means there absolutely needs to be a second roll After a hit check, not during, not before.

@Lord

This is also why the damage range on a weapon already accounts for grazing shots, because of the ambiguity of what a damage range represents. Like you said, and I said ( which makes restating it yourself rather odd ) the damage range on a weapon is ( theoretically ) accounting for things like where on the target you hit, how much armoring it had, could it have hit a vital spot like an organ or vein, etc.

I have to disagree with the damage range based on your hit chance in turn, for the same reasons already presented. Gameplay wise, It makes sense for a game that wanted to use it instead of a attack roll system, and I could get behind it. But logically it still doesn't make much sense, as again you would be conflating your chance to hit a target with "chance to hit them harder", which are two very different things, and why I don't care for grazing as it is now. A 10% chance to hit would not do 10% of your possible damage, youd either do "full damage" or "no damage" 10% of the time. Again, I genuinly love the idea of a system like that, but for the sake of this argument, it's going backwards to the point of changing grazing shots.

This also is why Defense and Dodge are also ambiguous mechanics, because what does Defense really represent? In game, it just reduces your chance to be hit...but how? How does a particular type of armor...when you are standing still, keep you from getting hit? It would make sense if the armor itself had some sort of feature, like camouflage / mirrors / etc. , but this is seldom represented in the armor / items that provide it. The same goes for cover, how does cover prevent you from getting hit? Gameplay wise...a 100% chance to hit in full cover would only ever hit your cover..not you. The shot would need to be able to penetrate the cover ( or circumvent it, like with an explosion , which brings another mechanic that needs to be implemented for cover reducing explosive damage properly ) to hit you. And gameplay ( and code ) wise ..you can get a 100% chance to hit a target in full cover. It also makes any chance to hit someone in cover moot, because you can't actually hit a target in cover...thats the point. And that's the general problem I have with Defense as a stat / mechanic, and why I mentioned it.

We can make concessions based on "we can't be realistic, its a video game" ..and that's fine and dandy, until you start to try and make realism in your video game ( combat sim...Long War as an entire concept.....hello ). Grazing shots as a mechanic, is and of itself, trying to add realism; so its entirely valid to expect it to actually act realistic. It's rather a half hearted argument to pick and choose when and where you draw the line between realism and "video gaming it", like if Call of Duty 2 all of a sudden let you carry 40,000 rounds of ammunition and let you melee tanks to do damage. You're either realistic, or you are not, there's no sense in trying to be both at the same time, and there's nothing wrong with having to choose either or; its pretty much the entire principal behind either one.

If Xcom2 LW2 wants to not be realistic in that capacity, that's entirely fine, and I can get behind it, but then it needs to act like it for everything, not just the thing it can't figure out how to make realistic. It's a poor mans fallback to do otherwise. If weapons want to use Thaco and other equipment Armor Class...so be it. But do it.
Swiftless
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by Swiftless »

JoeShmo wrote: If weapons want to use Thaco and other equipment Armor Class...so be it. But do it.
Way off topic but +1 just for mentioning Thaco.

It was sort of weird you specifically mention Thaco as this morning I was thinking about how much graze reminded me of the old D&D natural fumble rules.
Jadiel
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by Jadiel »

Swiftless wrote:
JoeShmo wrote: If weapons want to use Thaco and other equipment Armor Class...so be it. But do it.
Way off topic but +1 just for mentioning Thaco.

It was sort of weird you specifically mention Thaco as this morning I was thinking about how much graze reminded me of the old D&D natural fumble rules.
You have some amazing bug where your soldier rolling a graze means they take damage instead of the alien?!? :D
Thrombozyt
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by Thrombozyt »

Dodge and Defense should probably swap meaning as someone with a high Defense is more adept at avoiding being hit (you might say he is good at dodging) while someone with a high Dodge is good at mitigating damage (maybe because he has extra Defense in his armor).

The current mechanic is pretty sophisticated and mechanically sound. Don't forget, that crit chance also enables you to upgrade graze into hits while dodge downgrades grazes into misses. So a shot with 60% to hit and 100% to crit against 0% dodge will crit 50% of the time, hit normally 20% and miss 30% - no graze.

EDIT:
The reason why graze is better than massive damage spread on weapons is that aim helps you to get higher damage. Higher aim means higher 'proper hit' to graze ratio means more damage per hit. Get aim high enough and there aint no graze (aside from dodge). Low to-hit chances mean that even if you hit, you probably hit poorly while with high to-hit chances you mostly likely score a solid hit if you hit.
LordYanaek
Posts: 940
Joined: Mon Jan 23, 2017 1:34 pm

Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by LordYanaek »

JoeShmo wrote:It comes down to a difference of opinion on how the mechanic should work between you and me, and that's fine. Objectively though, the problem with grazing ( and to hit in general ) is that its way too ambiguous, as I pointed out, which is why I kinda wished you would have quoted more of my post that added context to the parts that you did quote.
It's ambiguous when you try to think too much about it. If you just accept that LW2 isn't trying to implement real physics and uses a simple dice roll instead to simulate the uncertainty of combat rather than simulate the combat i don't see why to-hit is ambiguous. It's just a representation of some enemies being more agile and some soldiers having better aim.
Sorry for the quotes but your post was pretty long so i mostly quoted parts to better show what part i was answering to. Since my post came immediately after your and both were pretty long i think people read both or none so hopefully everybody knew the context ;)
What does a 10% hit mean? That's an important subject to define before we can even have the debate on whether it's working like it should, or why it works the way it does. Realistically ( and gameplay mechanically ), a "hit' is just that ...making contact, regardless of whether you hit your intended spot or not ( this is where ambiguity comes into play ).....
Well, to me a 10% hit means a difficult shot. Once it hits it makes no difference of course whether it was 10% or 100% but when you're about to shoot it just means your soldier will have a hard time aiming. Sorry but i still don't see what's ambiguous :oops:
@Lord, Jadiel. .....A grazing shot, therefore, can never happen unless there is a hit, which means there absolutely needs to be a second roll After a hit check, not during, not before.
OK Let's see it this way with easy numbers.
Let's say you have a 80% chance to hit a target.
Let's say the target have 25% chance to dodge as it's agile, turning the hit into a graze.
You want graze to be a second roll so in order to graze you have to roll 0.8 for a hit *0.25 (the chance to dodge) : you will graze a total of 20% of the shots, 20% will be misses that are unaffected by dodge and the remaining 60% will be full hits.
How is this different from rolling a single roll where 0-60=hit, 61-80=dodge, 81-100=miss?
There is no difference at all except saving time by not rolling the second dice.
This is also why the damage range on a weapon already accounts for grazing shots, because of the ambiguity of what a damage range represents. Like you said, and I said ( which makes restating it yourself rather odd ) the damage range on a weapon is ( theoretically ) accounting for things like where on the target you hit, how much armoring it had, could it have hit a vital spot like an organ or vein, etc.
What's strange? I was just agreeing with the damage range part :)
I just consider graze as a more extreme end of the damage range where you don't even really wound the enemy. Sure it could be all bundled into a wider range of damage making assault rifles 1-5 rather than 3-5 with + graze. Why make it a different mechanic then rather than the old damage roulette? You would have to ask Pavonis but the way i see it is that it allows more subtle interactions with other mechanics such as crit and aim (since you can remove graze completely with high enough aim) (also agree with Thrombozyt here)
I have to disagree with the damage range based on your hit chance in turn, for the same reasons already presented...
Cutting the quote as it's not realistic to hope for something like this in LW2 so there's no point arguing about it.
This also is why Defense and Dodge are also ambiguous mechanics, because what does Defense really represent? In game, it just reduces your chance to be hit...but how? How does a particular type of armor...when you are standing still, keep you from getting hit? It would make sense if the armor itself had some sort of feature, like camouflage / mirrors / etc. , but this is seldom represented in the armor / items that provide it. The same goes for cover, how does cover prevent you from getting hit? Gameplay wise...a 100% chance to hit in full cover would only ever hit your cover..not you. The shot would need to be able to penetrate the cover ( or circumvent it, like with an explosion , which brings another mechanic that needs to be implemented for cover reducing explosive damage properly ) to hit you. And gameplay ( and code ) wise ..you can get a 100% chance to hit a target in full cover. It also makes any chance to hit someone in cover moot, because you can't actually hit a target in cover...thats the point. And that's the general problem I have with Defense as a stat / mechanic, and why I mentioned it.
I start to see where you're coming from but i'd say your view of the battlefield is static. Soldiers are never "standing still". People are not shooting at their enemies and then shouting "it's your turn". The turn based combat is an abstraction of real time action. When you shoot at someone behind full cover you're actually shooting at them the moment they peek their head to see where you are so you're not shooting through the cover, you're shooting "through" the short time when they are exposed and that's why it's harder to hit them. You don't always have 100 on that flanked sectoid because it's not a sitting duck and it's running towards another cover as soon as you flank it (or whatever other action you might imagine)
We can make concessions based on "we can't be realistic, its a video game" ..and that's fine and dandy, until you start to try and make realism in your video game ( combat sim...Long War as an entire concept.....hello ). Grazing shots as a mechanic, is and of itself, trying to add realism; so its entirely valid to expect it to actually act realistic. It's rather a half hearted argument to pick and choose when and where you draw the line between realism and "video gaming it", like if Call of Duty 2 all of a sudden let you carry 40,000 rounds of ammunition and let you melee tanks to do damage. You're either realistic, or you are not, there's no sense in trying to be both at the same time, and there's nothing wrong with having to choose either or; its pretty much the entire principal behind either one.
But there is a limit on how much realism you can put into the abstraction of a turn based tactical game which is what LW2 is unlike Call of Duty. Why do you think a game must be either totally realistic or not at all? There's plenty of shades of gray between black and white. Or maybe i should say.

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If Xcom2 LW2 wants to not be realistic in that capacity, that's entirely fine, and I can get behind it, but then it needs to act like it for everything, not just the thing it can't figure out how to make realistic. It's a poor mans fallback to do otherwise. If weapons want to use Thaco and other equipment Armor Class...so be it. But do it.
I don't think the Graze Band is perfect but i think it does it's job well enough. In order to have the entirely realistic game you seem to crave for in XCOM2s engine would require rewriting the entire combat system to make it (quasi) real-time and using physics based projectiles. Than you would have to multiply the size of the maps dozens of times because with the current size everyone should be able to hear, see and shoot from one side of the map to the opposite one.
I fear you'll never be happy with XCOM2 or any of it's mods if you hope for something totally realistic.

Oh, and no to THAC0 (BTW it's zero, not "o") because THAC0 is for d20 systems. XCOM is d100 system ;)
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JoeShmo
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Re: Proposal: Phase out graze for higher-accuracy shots

Post by JoeShmo »

LordYanaek wrote:It's ambiguous when you try to think too much about it. If you just accept that LW2 isn't trying to implement real physics and uses a simple dice roll instead to simulate the uncertainty of combat rather than simulate the combat i don't see why to-hit is ambiguous. It's just a representation of some enemies being more agile and some soldiers having better aim.
Sorry for the quotes but your post was pretty long so i mostly quoted parts to better show what part i was answering to. Since my post came immediately after your and both were pretty long i think people read both or none so hopefully everybody knew the context ;)
It's ambiguous because it's just that...not because I'm trying to make it complicated in thought. I mean...I'm pretty sure I was pretty explanatory in a very straight forward way of why I thought anything was ambiguous. There seems to be a disconnect between what I'm arguing, and what you interpret my intentions as ( and arguing against that..instead of what I'm saying )

To accept that LW2 isn't trying to implement something realistic to the game, then we would have to ignore grazing as a mechanic, infiltration as a mechanic, reinforcements as a mechanic, etc. These are all changes to the base game because they explicitly state they are trying to make the game a more realistic guerrilla experience. One would then have to actually state that you'd need to make a case of accepting that LW2 isn't just trying to make an asymmetrical gaming experience, instead of saying they aren't trying to be realistic. It's the other way around to your claim.

On a side note, I get that you want to keep your post length down, but you can never assume or presume knowledge of context, especially when it comes to segmented conversations ( like posts in a thread, or tweeting about something someone said in an interview about what someone said in a briefing. ) At the very least, you should indicate that you are paraphrasing a quote, or omitting sections of it with "snip" comments or ellipsis "...." around parts that may not be contextually relevant, but still showing that something is missing. Not trying to turn this into an English lesson ( or otherwise ), just trying to be journalistic-ally responsible from my viewpoint.


Well, to me a 10% hit means a difficult shot. Once it hits it makes no difference of course whether it was 10% or 100% but when you're about to shoot it just means your soldier will have a hard time aiming. Sorry but i still don't see what's ambiguous :oops:
Because you're conflating to hit with grazing ( or vise verse ). A 10% or 100% chance to hit matters on the premise of hitting a target; grazing a target comes after a hit is concluded. You bake a cake before you decide whether it is going be covered in orange frosting or not, not before.

Choosing to graze a target intentionally is irrelevant to the point of hitting a target to begin with, other than adding chance to miss if you were aiming at specific parts of the body ( like the shoulder ) that would then give greater chance of miss. This is part of what makes "to hit" ambiguous, because there is no such distinction of selection in shot target other than the entity itself. If you've played any Fallout game you should totally get what I'm saying in that context, and why I'm not saying the to hit system is wrong, just that it's ambiguous, and why I believe the damage range already justifies / compensates for what grazing would already define given that ambiguity.


OK Let's see it this way with easy numbers.
Let's say you have a 80% chance to hit a target.
Let's say the target have 25% chance to dodge as it's agile, turning the hit into a graze.
You want graze to be a second roll so in order to graze you have to roll 0.8 for a hit *0.25 (the chance to dodge) : you will graze a total of 20% of the shots, 20% will be misses that are unaffected by dodge and the remaining 60% will be full hits.
How is this different from rolling a single roll where 0-60=hit, 61-80=dodge, 81-100=miss?
There is no difference at all except saving time by not rolling the second dice.
Because you've overly simplified something that is a tad bit more complex. A graze is not a 20% chance..its a 25% chance ( as per your dodge model ), which is why it needs another roll. The reason why you don't roll them all at the same time ( and why I hate how crit works ) is because you've diminished something at the same time. Rolling 0-60 for a hit and 61-80 for a graze is not the same thing as first rolling 0-80 for a hit and then 0-25 for a graze. It saves cycles for computing, but it's wrong. It's blatantly wrong by 6%.

It's the same thing with crit. If you have 60% chance to hit, and 30% chance to crit, you then don't have 20% chance to crit ( 0-40 hit, 41-60 crit ). People say the grazing issue is merely a problem with the UI ..but it's also a disconnect between trains of thought between the people making the formulas and logics. It's okay if you want to use a single roll system, but then you need to be completely upfront with the values in game, not just the UI itself. If a sniper ability gives you 10% additional chance to crit...it needs to actually give you 10% ..not 6 or 8% because of how the to hit roll works.


What's strange? I was just agreeing with the damage range part :)
I just consider graze as a more extreme end of the damage range where you don't even really wound the enemy. Sure it could be all bundled into a wider range of damage making assault rifles 1-5 rather than 3-5 with + graze. Why make it a different mechanic then rather than the old damage roulette? You would have to ask Pavonis but the way i see it is that it allows more subtle interactions with other mechanics such as crit and aim (since you can remove graze completely with high enough aim) (also agree with Thrombozyt here)
It was strange because you stated it as if I didn't, and had no idea how it worked or what it meant. So yes, if you were agreeing with me, It was really odd to basically teach the same lesson all over again right after someone else did..in order to agree with them ^.^ .

Making assault rifles 1-5 is precisely the point of the argument that damage range already does grazing.....
Am I speaking Chinese here? lol ( no offense )

I also think that what Throm said is backwards. How would defense allow you to avoid damage, while dodge allows you to mitigate it? I mean.... am I in a thread stuck in "Backwards Day" ? When you hit a tank with an 50 caliber round ....do you say that the tank's armor dodged the bullet? Or that the driver steering away from a landmine mitigated damage that was never actually done to it? Again, I'm not picking on anyone for a thought / comment like that...but it rather does indicate to me that I could be discussing a matter with folks that have a fairly lax grasp on logical / straight forward concepts and/or definitions.


"I have to disagree with the damage range based on your hit chance in turn, for the same reasons already presented..."
Cutting the quote as it's not realistic to hope for something like this in LW2 so there's no point arguing about it.
Then why bring it up? I mean, this kinda goes counter to the entire back and forth in this thread, where seemingly nobody want's to actually change grazing, yet we still make opinion / quips about it none the less. It's not like your comment was off topic, off base, or outrageously unrealistic; quite the contrary to what I had said in reply to it in fact. So it seems rather odd to not want to talk about it and/or reply saying you wont talk about it. You could have just not quoted it and responded to it :P . Kinda like how you snip parts of my comments when you quote me lol. ( bazinga! ) <3


I start to see where you're coming from but i'd say your view of the battlefield is static. Soldiers are never "standing still". People are not shooting at their enemies and then shouting "it's your turn". The turn based combat is an abstraction of real time action. When you shoot at someone behind full cover you're actually shooting at them the moment they peek their head to see where you are so you're not shooting through the cover, you're shooting "through" the short time when they are exposed and that's why it's harder to hit them. You don't always have 100 on that flanked sectoid because it's not a sitting duck and it's running towards another cover as soon as you flank it (or whatever other action you might imagine)
Now I feel like you are the one overthinking things. No, turn based games certainly do not behave like you present, nor are they subjective snapshots of combat that fits into abstract ways of rationalization. The point of a turn based game is to give you real time combat in "time outs" , where you typically each take turns making all your choices. Some games make it so both sides take their turn at the same time, and some make it so you can only make singular choices per turn ( instead of letting you make actions for all your units / structures / effects / etc. ).

When you shoot at someone when they are behind cover...you are shooting them when they are behind cover, that's it. A person peaking out would be an action on their turn, not the enemy turn; it's the entire principal behind the gameplay genre and mechanic. It's what also makes things like the a sectoid being flanked irrelevant on whether you perceive it to be still in motion, as at that time and moment it is not..it's flanked at that spot, at that particular angle of action. What you suggest is more ambiguity ...which sounds ironic considering the previous exchanges of dialogue.

I have no qualms with people "roleplaying" what they see as happening during a tactical fight, I mean...its video games...that's kinda the cherished point of it; but lets not confuse that for practicality of gameplay / realism.

If I was "shooting through" a short window of time where they were not in cover...then the entire mechanic of the game is created wrong. Actions would act with shorter walk / run distances to facilitate those moments, and there would never be a need for reaction fire from opposing teams. Reaction fire / overwatch, suppression fire, and ever tying that involves that...IS...what constitutes "shooting while getting into cover" as you explain. Once you are "in cover" ...you are in cover; you made the specific choice to stop there, otherwise you would have run past it onto a different spot during your turn.

I don't mean to demean your aesthetic / immersion with the game, but I seriously question any validity of that viewpoint in terms of gameplay and/or genre ( even for just this game in particular ). It's just literally untrue.


But there is a limit on how much realism you can put into the abstraction of a turn based tactical game which is what LW2 is unlike Call of Duty. Why do you think a game must be either totally realistic or not at all? There's plenty of shades of gray between black and white. Or maybe i should say.

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It's not about limitations, its about consistency; and it's not about whether they use one type or the other, but that they stick with it and not try and mix the two in ways that pulls from the aesthetic and/or gameplay itself.

Xcom games clearly do not go nearly as far into realism as they could, and I would say the same for "realistic" games like Call of Duty. Games after all always have some semblance of abstract "game" in it ( unless its a walking simulator ). I'm not saying that a game has to be completely realistic or completely unrealistic, and I'm pretty sure no game has ever achieved either spectrum. The point was that if you are going to cater to realism, then you need to be consistent in everything you do or present. If you add PhysX tech into your game...you can't just create parts of the world that don't use it; It's inconsistent, jarring, and generally puts players off if it pertains to important mechanics that are derived from having it.

Imagine if Breath of the Wild only had durability for swords, or Minecraft only had voxel blocks for digging, or only female soldiers in Xcom could be customized with gear / looks. It's not about whether a game is completely realistic or not ..it's about the consistency of the context in which it's being judged. If grazing is being added for realism ...then many other things that the damage range obscures should be added too. And if you're going to be adamant about weapon combat ( including abilities, utility items, etc. ) being as complex / realistic as it is now compared to before, then for consistency things like dodge, defense, cover, environmental damage / structure strength, etc. should be handled with the same scrutiny / enhancements.

If it's "not here yet", that's one thing, but what is already down the pipe should be a reflection of position.


I don't think the Graze Band is perfect but i think it does it's job well enough. In order to have the entirely realistic game you seem to crave for in XCOM2s engine would require rewriting the entire combat system to make it (quasi) real-time and using physics based projectiles. Than you would have to multiply the size of the maps dozens of times because with the current size everyone should be able to hear, see and shoot from one side of the map to the opposite one.
I fear you'll never be happy with XCOM2 or any of it's mods if you hope for something totally realistic.

Oh, and no to THAC0 (BTW it's zero, not "o") because THAC0 is for d20 systems. XCOM is d100 system ;)
Again, I believe you are trying to make an argument against what you perceive my intentions to be, rather than what I have actually stated / argued. I'm not arguing for Xcom 2 to be as realistic as possible, I'm simply pointing out inconsistency of design, and frankly just debating the parts of people's comments that I quote.

The initial argument was about grazing ....not whether Xcom should be more like Call of Duty or a real time 4x game. Just because I reference other things for examples..does not mean I'm campaigning for something like them. You can compare an apple to an orange...without making it sound like you want all grape vines to produce apple tasting grapes. ( yes, that was intentionally presented as a confusing statement, because this discussion is becoming just that with the things I feel I need to elaborate / defend points on )

Feeling the need to correct my usage of Thaco ...makes my head hurt.
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