Trip Attack

[Jaenak]

I saw it done on a war movie I watched quite a while ago. A knight charged at an enemy commander, the enemy drove his spear into the ground at a diagnal angle and tripped the knight, effectively dismounting him. I think it'd be useful to impliment such a thing as an attack in this game.

For an example:

Turn 1:

Elvish Scout runs across your spearman and attacks. The attack is successful and you take damage.

Turn 2:

You tell your spearman to attack the Elvish scout with his trip attack.

Turn 3:

The Elvish Scout attacks again, the trip attack is proccessed and if successful, the Elvish Scout is dismounted and your spearman suffers no damage that turn from that attack. Otherwise, if the scout doesn't attack this turn, the trip attack is discarded this turn and must be used again.

I'm not a coder but I don't see it'd be terribly difficult to impliment. If the player attacks with the trip attack, the computer finds out if the enemy unit is a mounted one or not, if so, the trip attack continues to be proccessed, otherwise the trip attack isn't processed but the player's unit suffers a defense decrease for the duration of one turn or something. Also since I would think it would be difficult to perform, you could only make it an option for units that have leveled up at least once to level 1 or higher. (just to keep the basic and the vast majority of the units from doing it.) Plus, if it was given only to the units with long weapons, (I.E. spearmen or pikemen), then it would make more sense. That way if the distribution of the attack was limited and was given only to advanced units, the attack couldn't be overused and thus effectively eliminate the usefulness of the mounted units. If the player attacked with the trip attack, it could have a certain percent chance of being successful like always and would work or fail accordingly. The computer could take the enemy mounted unit, remember the name, level, health and tile location of the mounted unit, delete the mounted unit, ask the owner what non-mounted unit to replace it with (I.E. Elvish Captain or Hero) and create that unit where the other used to be with the mounted unit's name, level number and health minus the damage dealt by the trip attack. Plus you could stick it with a "slow" for one turn and attribute it to the guy picking himself up off the ground.

This is just an idea and could be done one of many ways to limit it's use, control it's "fairness" and increase the ease of implimentation via coding.

[Elvish_Pillager]

You tell your spearman to attack the Elvish scout with his trip attack.

Turn 3:

The Elvish Scout attacks again,

Why would it do that? It knows you're trying to trip it...

I'm not a coder but I don't see it'd be terribly difficult to impliment.

AFAIK, Wesnoth is not good at keeping track of individual units in such a manner that this attack could be used on a particular unit.

the computer finds out if the enemy unit is a mounted one or not,

How does it do that? There's no in-game variable that tells whether a unit is mounted.

ask the owner what non-mounted unit to replace it with (I.E. Elvish Captain or Hero)

So that's why you'd attack with an Elvish Scout against a tripping unit! You just want the more powerful Elvish Fighter on your side!

[Circon]

So... it's a special ability, that works so that if the enemy attacks on the turn after he was "tripped", he will be knocked off his horse, or suffer defense decrease if non-mounted?
How about flying units? How about mermen? How does a spear or two trip a cuttlefish? How would the AI use it?

Seems borrowed from D&D, breaks KISS, nonintuitive, and introduces several things for botht he comp and the player to keep track of. It's a nice concept you have there, but it seems to belong in another game.

Sorry, mate. It just doesn't look like it could work.

[Jaenak]

Okay, maybe I said it wrong. I'll try to clarify it as best as I can.

This would be a special attack given to units with long weapons and would be used only against horse/wolf-riding units. No swimmers, no flyers, just mounted land based units. It wouldn't need to be dismounted on the third turn, it could even be dismounted on the turn the attack was used, afterall the fights in this game are supposed to emulate combat. If the attack is successful, the mounted unit is replaced with a non-mounted unit of the owner's choice of the same level and stats as the previous mounted unit.

What the game can or cannot keep track of and what there are and are not variables for is of no concern to me. If those are the only reasons not to impliment something, then it'd be a better idea to file them away for the day the game develops a more advanced engine instead of throwing the ideas out the window entirely. Besides that, whether something sounds like it would work or not and what reasons exist to avoid using something is all dependant upon whether the person in question likes the idea and is willing to go through the effort of implimenting it.

*Jaenak*

By The Way - I'm not mad, just trying to offer clarification and cover my bases. If I came across as rude, please forgive me, that was not my intent in the slightest. After all, this is just an idea, nothing more and nothing less. Besides that, this isn't my game and thus I have no say in how it is created. And I don't play D&D.

Good Night Everybody

[Circon]

You'd still have to check whether the enemy is mounted, and it's a Bad Thing (tm) to be able to morph the enemy's units without their choice. Also, this requires a dialog box for the unit's owner - something that is not present in the level-up event. We're also avoiding one turn popping up boxes for another player.

Never played D&D? Ok. It just reminded me a lot of the Trip ability and Improved Trip feats.

[Elvish_Pillager]

This would be a special attack given to units with long weapons and would be used only against horse/wolf-riding units. No swimmers, no flyers, just mounted land based units.

Cavalryman, Horseman, Elvish Scout, Wolf Rider, Mounted Captain... IS THE CHOCOBONE ON THE LIST?

It wouldn't need to be dismounted on the third turn, it could even be dismounted on the turn the attack was used, afterall the fights in this game are supposed to emulate combat. If the attack is successful, the mounted unit is replaced with a non-mounted unit of the owner's choice of the same level and stats as the previous mounted unit.

In almost all combat situations, a non-mounted unit is better than a mounted unit. (Knight->Swordsman is the one exception, but if you can choose, then heck--choose for your Knight to become an Orcish Slayer!)

develops a more advanced engine

Adding a "horsed=" attribute would not be more advanced, just more cluttered.

instead of throwing the ideas out the window entirely.

I'm not doing that, but this idea needs a great deal of improvement if it's to be game-worthy, IMO.

On the subject of improving it, here's an idea: Have 'Trip' be an attack ability, and what it does is this: When a trip attack hits a unit, that unit's moves are reduced to 3 until it begins a turn in a position which is not adjacent to any enemy unit.

[Invisible Philosopher]

Never played D&D? Ok. It just reminded me a lot of the Trip ability and Improved Trip feats.

I'd actually be surprised if most realistic-sounding ideas weren't in Warcraft or D&D. D&D has lots of 'realistic' stuff, and Warcraft is a somewhat similar sort of game to Wesnoth that happens to be popular. At least it seems like people complain that an idea is from one of those a lot, and likely the person with the idea hasn't even played the game in question. An idea being in or from another game does not affect its merits for Wesnoth.

BTW I have not played Warcraft and have only minimal experience with D&D.