Development > Design

Design: Soldier stats

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BTAxis:
Purpose of this thread: Brainstorming the soldier stats, their effects and the way in which they are developed.

So far this has not been an issue because it's far away on the schedule at best, but with revision 875 Hoehrer has added some weapon classes to the weapon design docs, so I feel this thread becomes a bit more called for.

The weapon classes that Hoehrer has allocated are the following:

- Assault
- Close
- Precision
- Heavy
- Explosive

In addition to these, I would introduce Psi. I think all weapons in the game can be categorized with those six.

Now, a soldier should have those six weapon classes as aptitude values, either as direct skill bars that you can develop individually, or emergent as functions of a superset of more general abilities (strength, agility, etc). I would go with a hybrid of these, with emphasis on the former. While it certainly does make a difference how agile a soldier is, if he's holding a pistol for the first time he won't be a crack shot. On the other hand, no amount of practice with a rocket launcher will make a downright wimpy soldier be able to lift and aim one correctly.

So what I propose is a set of five basic attributes for every soldier: Strength, Agility, Endurance, Intelligence and Psionic Strength (this last one would be hidden until the appropriate Psi research is complete). Below these are the five "normal" weapon proficiencies: Assault, Close, Precision, Heavy and Explosive. Psi weapons would take their strength directly from the Psionic Strength attribute, as Psionic warfare is literally in the mind and doesn't work in the same way normal warfare does.

Each primary attribute (except Psi) should affect two weapon classes, the first majorly and the second minorly:
Strength should affect proficiency with Heavy and Explosive equipment.
Agility should affect proficiency with Close and Precision equipment.
Endurance should affect proficiency with Assault and Heavy equipment.
Intelligency should affect proficiency with Explosive and Close equipment.
Psionic Strength should affect only Psi equipment.

Aside from that, the first four basic attributes should affect things like max TUs, max carrying capacity, damage taken from attacks, recovery rate after being injured, ability to wear heavy armor and ability to spot aliens.

I'm going to abstract from precise mechanics for increasing the soldier stats for now - that's complicated and requires a lot of hands-on tuning, and we're not at that stage yet. However, I will say that weapon proficiencies should be trained through use of weaponry (separately from the modifiers they gain from the primary attributes), and they should inhibit each other. This would mean that a soldier who is an unmatched sniper will always do poorly with other weapons. It's also possible to have a soldier who is fairly OK with all weapons, but excels in none. In short, there should be a limited pool of weapon expertise to go around for each soldier, so every soldier will evolve into a specific role, such as sniper, squaddie, heavy support, etc.

Training of the primary attributes should occur through training programs at the base, (possibly) implants, and/or various factors on the battlefield.

Malick:
Hi !

If you allow me to slightly alter what you proposed, this is what I think better reflects the attributes' influence on weapon classes.

Strength should affect proficiency with Close and Heavy equipment.
Agility should affect proficiency with Assault and Explosive equipment.
Endurance should affect proficiency with Heavy and Assault equipment.
Intelligence should affect proficiency with Explosive and Precision equipment.
Psionic Strength should affect only Psi equipment.

Otherwise, I agree on most of what you said. I believe a soldier stats should depend on his/her basic attributes. Then, according to training and experience, these values may evolve so that the soldier can turn out into a specialist or a general purpose fighter.

IDEA/ PROPOSAL :
There could be another stat to reflect a soldier ability to command to others, let's call it command. According to the soldier's rank (private, sergeant, lieutnant, captain, major, colonel) and to this stat, the soldier could try to calm down or raise the morale of other soldiers through an action button, kind like a weapon is handled, targeted at a particular soldier. This action would have a given chance of success, depending on distance between the two soldiers (like weapons), rank (a sergeant has a better chance of calming down than a colonel, but a colonel can reach a lot farther) and the "command" stat. This would give good clues to the player or promotion algorithm which soldier to promote first and give a more important role to officers and NCO.

What do you think ?

BTAxis:

--- Quote from: "Malick" ---Strength should affect proficiency with Close and Heavy equipment.
Agility should affect proficiency with Assault and Explosive equipment.
Endurance should affect proficiency with Heavy and Assault equipment.
Intelligence should affect proficiency with Explosive and Precision equipment.
Psionic Strength should affect only Psi equipment.
--- End quote ---


Hmm, Strength for Close? I understand how that would work with melee weapons, but keep in mind that pistols also rank as Close. I think Agility would make more sense that way. As for the rest, that works for me.


--- Quote from: "Malick" ---IDEA/ PROPOSAL :
<snip>
What do you think ?
--- End quote ---

I think that's a good idea, though morale is currently not implemented. Also, I think there doesn't need to be a special stat for it, just the rank will do. In the original UFO, rank alone affected morale issues, including loss of morale when a ranking soldier was killed.

Mattn:

--- Quote from: "BTAxis" ---... though morale is currently not implemented ...
--- End quote ---


morale is implemented.

BTAxis:
Sorry, my bad.

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