I'm working on smoothing this out myself for the story world's game system and thus far this is the hardest part. Combat is a love or hate thing in most LitRPGs from what I've seen. People either adore the numbers or hate them. They find them boring or they want more! A good combat system gets a ton of praise and if you have one that's crappy or fills like filler, man the LitRPG readers let you know in reviews! So since I'm trying to puzzle out my own, I thought I'd poke the forum's collective minds for tips, thoughts, and discussion on LitRPG and what makes or breaks a book's combat system. So what do you like? Dislike? What makes you throw a book across the room? If you've written a book, how did you design your system and numbers?
For me, I like the actual fight to be described so I feel like I'm there. I don't want to see just... You hit orc for 30 damage! You hit orc for 22 damage! You hit orc for 40 damage! Orc has died! I find just a list of damage text really borrowing. A full immersion game is going to have exciting, intense combat that gives you a rush. Not two figures taking turns slowly smacking each other, which is what a list of damage makes me think of. I'd rather see something like "I swung my sword at the orc, feeling a thrill as I struck it for 30 damage. This new weapon had been worth the gold. Two more blows and the orc dropped, but I didn't have time to gloat as I turned to face the warg racing toward me." Something that gives me a little taste of the damage without being overwhelming and let's me know how the fight is going so I can see it in my head. For an example in an actual book, I really love the combat in @Paul Bellow 's Tower of Gates series. It has a nice balance of description and damage text that works super well. I actually want to use something similar for my Pryde stories, although tweaked for the different scenario and, of course, with my own twists and details. Paul's books are actually inspiring me to look up words to use for moves/combat that applies to lions, such as Rend, Tears, Mauls, etc. Those little details in his system are just really nice touches and it's one of the things that really stands out for me in his series and keeps me reading it. As for my personal design, I'm still working on it. My big worry is numbers, as in how many HP a hit removes, etc. I'm trying to keep the numbers in the book fairly small as that makes it easier for the reader to understand and keep track of, at least I think so. For example, trying to remember how much HP a boss has left is hard if they started with a million or if a hit that does 5,000 damage is big or small in the context of the system. However, if the setting has Hit Points ranging from 100 to 300, a reader can instantly know that a blow doing 50 damage is huge, etc. So I'm going for nice, small, simple math that won't make the reader have to break out the calculator.
OHHHH I Get it. Sorry. Bit slow on the pickup. Even in TurnBased RPG's these days you'll find that the fighting is more cinematic. I mean sure you're going to see that your longsword did 8 damage, but you'll see the movement of the fighter as well. I think Final Fantasy does well with this, though I haven't played the most recent one sadly....very sad. The point though is that there is a flow, a movement that pulls you in a bit deeper. You feel excited to see the super special move because it's much more than numbers. So on that aspect I absolutely agree. Going by damage is an easy 'out' for a LitRPG author.
Generally, I think described events are better. When something new or interesting happens, try to accompany it with some battle log text. That helps maintain the idea that stats influence damage. If hit points fly off when you do damage, that could be worked into the description as well. They did something like that in Threadbare when they describe numbers fly off as the blows connected.
I like when there's some video-gaminess to the combat, so I definitely like numbers. My thought is if combat is 100% realistic, I'd rather be reading straight fantasy/sci-fi. I also like video-game number strategies when it comes to combat. One other major thing: I love it when characters think about what they're going to do in the middle of combat, like: --- The orc closed in on Heather, who was still lying on the ground, her health hanging dangerously low at 12HP. A single blow would finish her off. I struggled to move, but the orc shaman's previous Entangling Vines were still wrapped around my legs, biting painfully into my skin with every movement. The orc's face twisted in a sadistic smile as he raised his axe over Heather. Gathering my mana, I knew I had just enough of it for a single Flameblast, but at Level 3 it still had 25% chance to miss, and if that happened it would leave both of us in a very vulnerable position. "Wait!" I shouted. --- I like to think of it as "key combat" and "cosmetic combat" scenes (sorry for the dubious made-up terms). Key combat happens where you want to focus on the 'game' and 'strategy' of the combat. Cosmetic combat is just when you're blasting through trash mobs and stuff. In key combat, every move should have meaning, and numbers should be perfectly crunched, advanced strategy put in play, and stakes raised. 'Cosmetic combat' is just a fun run through mobs and can be glossed over more. --- Running out of the collapsing cave, I spun around to take care of the nearest of our pursuers. My sword caught two at once. Orc Soldier dies. You gain 12 XP. Orc Soldier dies. You gain 12 XP. The orcs were only one level below me, and I shouldn't have been able to do that, but then I realized Heather was keeping up Word of Strength on my weapon. "Thanks!" I told her. "Hope you're getting XP for these kills?" "Oh, ya," she said. --- What I don't like is... unplanned key combats (?) I feel like action scenes should be edited like movies. Good action movies know exactly what is happening in each 'shot' (or each sentence/paragraph). Bad action scenes are just confusing "A punches B, B punches A, A punches B, A punches B again" What I don't like is something like this (which is also due to it being badly-written): --- I swung my axe at the orc on the table. The orc screamed in pain as it struck his side, spilling blood. The orc fell over as I removed my axe. Two more orcs were running through the door, screaming battle shouts. I rushed in, activated my Warrior's Frenzy, and immediately decapitated both of them. The orc leader cursed at me after seeing two of his men fall so quickly. One more orc appeared at the door, this one wielding a giant mace. Ignoring the new warrior at the door, I rushed at the orc leader, and he raised his wooden shield to block my attack. I kicked him, and at the same time spun around to block the mace-wielding orc who was trying to smash my head in with his heavy weapon. ---
For a book to stay in my hands, it needs to give me some sort of confidence that the author thought about this scenario: Joe, Laura and Denny log into the game, as completely new players. In real life, Joe is the baddasest badass ever spawned from the Navy SEALs. Laura is the reigning UFC lightweight champion. Denny is a brilliantest NASA rocket scientist who has never launched a punch (outside other videogames). Does the above make any difference for in-game combat? At the end of the day, IMHO that's one of the challenges of realism. Take Laura, for example, and her character, Arual. In-game, Arual is probably physically weaker than Laura is in real life (since Laura trainds daily as the elite MMA fighter she is), while Arual is a level 0 character... ... now, say Arual decides to tackle an orc: can she literally do that like an MMA fighter would, as in literaly go for a double-leg tackle & takedown, so she can brazilian jiu-jitsu the orc on the ground (where the orc being stronger is not such a big advantage)? Does Laura's skills in throwing a punch translate to Arual's skills in doing so? Or, say that in the game there are guns: does Rocket Scientist Danny shoot in-game as well as Joe Badass SEAL (since their characters have the same skill), or does Joe has a leg up here (since he's a deadly sniper in real life)? IMHO, a good combat system for a FIVR game needs to take the above into account, and decide whether or not it makes a difference. Interestingly, methinks in-game Magic doesn't have this problem (since nobody knows magic in real-life). But if combat is portrayed realistically (with things as which limb/organ to target making a difference, for example), then either what the player knows should somehow translate to what the character can do, or have a very good explanation for why it's not the case. One very good example about the latter would be a game in which characters are not human, by the way, which seems to be your case! =) (as in: Laura MMA skills probably do not translate to lion-fighting, lions don't shoot guns, etc: problem solved from the setting, which is grand methinks)
Those are actually some really good points. It's actually not a scenario I see happening often in LitRPG books, at least not the ones I've read so far. I think the only ones I can think of is Delvers, which has the main characters knowing some swordsmanship and such. It applies to them and definitely helps them out. That's a really good point though about experience affecting gameplay. I mean, true, it probably wouldn't apply to lion-related stuff, but it would apply to a lot of things in most games.
Yes, that's my preferred way of doing things. If anything, I'd much rather stats not intrude on the action itself. You can have full stats at the start and the end, and you can tie in the numbers to the prose, but breaking it up with notifications that you've done X damage after every single attack or instance of taking damage is padding at best.
Gonna 2cents all over this: I have a cheat sheet of combat flavours (attached) that I find super helpful when I'm struggling to add that special something to a fight scene. I am sorry to say, I don't remember exactly where I read it or who said it, but the advice I stick to when writing a combat scene is 'make it dirty.' I've been told my fights are terrifying and visceral for this reason, blood, sweat, tears and snot, bile and broken nails. The LitRPG I'm working on at the moment, however, I've actually broken that rule a little and thinking about it now, I think that has weakened some of my early scenes. I will say, that advice was for gumshoe and detective novel writing so it doesn't necessarily work for all fights. I have read some I found 'too dirty' (prince of thorns by Mark Lawrence) so there is such thing as overboard for any audience. A good fight needs high stakes- not to be mistaken for 'world ending' every time. I think this is something shounen anime do really well; their pride, their honour, their sense of self is somehow what is on the line. The fight might not mean a lot in the big picture, but it does in the small picture and that is where you'll capture the readers. I have had moments in manga and anime where the fight I wanted to watch, the one I needed to see, was unimportant for the plot. It was a side character trying to rise above their own limits, or face a demon from their past who thinks they have the upper hand. If the fight isn't important, gloss over it. Knowing that this badass level 100 fighter just threw three level 20 brawlers out a window shows how epic he is; they are miniscule to him. Watching the fighter then struggle against his nemesis and almost die later just elevates the internal stakes we've invested in this warrior. It might just be me, but I've read fights that actually made me bored before. A fight should never make you bored. It should be the culmination; should have a lot of weight. I think this is why the Princess Bride's fight scenes do so well; there aren't that many of them and the stakes are personal for the most part. For a more modern example; episode 2 of Daredevil. 'the hallway fight' as most of us remember. We have clear stakes, the hero gets wailed on, the bad guys don't all stay down after one hit, theres blood on the ground, broken limbs, split knuckles, busted lips, etc. That fight as a scene in a novel will not be all blow-by-blow. It will be about the protagonist standing up, catching his breath, groaning and grunting with the force of the blows, vision blurring, heartbeat pounding, pulse thready. It will have us worried that he's just taken on more than he can chew. If I am not sure the hero will live, despite still having most of the book to go, then you've done well. if I'm not sure the hero will recover from the fallout, such as losing his best gear, etc. that is ideal. Also, having a hero lose a fight. Very much yes. Losing a fight tells the reader you are not afraid to show us consequences. But they have to actually lose; not just fail because of the badguy cheating, not because of server disconnect, etc. The hero that doesn't measure up at the start of the book, but has worked out their failure and now stands taller at the end is a lot more inspiring. And that's my 2 cents.
I prefer combat mechanics that emphasize skill. My ideal game would be a Capcom vs SNK level of fighting mechanics coupled with an RPG world. The best skill-based combat in an MMO/RPG I've played is Guild Wars 1. Unsurprisingly, these games are balanced for PvP more than PvE. To me, stats are among the least important elements of game fighting. They dictate what options are available or a play style. But the real game mechanics of fighting are things like skill cooldowns, activation/casting times, blocking/counters, skill synergy/combos, distance based effects, and so on. These are the important numbers, not the damage popups. Traditional RPGs make some use of these. For example, aggro is a distance based effect. But skill range/distance is much, much more important in GW1 tactics than in most other RPGs. Warriors will build up adrenaline with bows, using up one weapon slot. Kiting and crippling are crucial. There's a reason paragons are gimped to half range spear throws. Etc. I'm trying to emphasize this aspect of gaming fights in my own writing. I think this is a style of fighting that litrpg can offer that most fantasy can't. Anime does touch on this a bit, where they get very "mechanistic", and I love that about Hunter x Hunter, Kenshin, etc.
