Reply To: Extra attacks on fleeing / skills

[Ferqal]

If the controlling factor of oppertunity attacks is the enemies AP, not your personal fatigue then you do have unlimited attacks. In a situation where people can reach multiple targets – which happen often in melee – it’s trivial for someone to potentially be able to whip out 2-6 attacks, then take their turn for more attacks. For instance, ghouls tend to have high initiative, decent AP and low morale so they’ll swarm one fighter, then flee when you retaliate. At that point the one brother gets to hit every single fleeing enemy at least once. It creates an odd and potentially exploitable game-y situation once your units reach high enough to have a decent melee defense score to soak the initial charge. I had one swordmaster with a melee defence of 82 (!) because of perks. Stuck him on a hill with riposte, he killed 4 werewolves because they get 3 attacks (3 return strikes per werewolf!), then got even more attacks when the terrified werewolves tried to run away after he decapitated one of them. That seems at best somewhat unintentional, if also very fitting of the guy described as the greatest fighter in the world. For other, lesser mortals that seems weird.

The various skills and weapons work fine for keeping your people alive. That’s not the issue here. The problem isn’t even really my people. They’re doing fine. I’m just starting to feel sympathy for the young orcs who charge in, see one of their mates get killed, then flee and immediately get butchered by 3 return attacks, causing another orc to flee, who in turn gets butchered… Try giving your people ranged wepaons and the “Quick Hands” perk. You get off enough shots to make enemies at least “wavering” before they close in, and a few more hits will cause them to flee at which point they’re dead. If you add “Fearsome” it gets worse. Hilarious! But also odd. At least the undead don’t flee.

The issue is that fleeing *feels odd* when the person you’re trying to flee from turns into an invincible weapon-god who has reflexes of such prodigious ability that they can whip out a series of 2-6 attacks, but only when the player is not directly controlling them. When I’m controlling them they’re somehow always at max fatigue and weakly, huffingly do their 1 attack before running out of breath. The slackers. Then I turn my back and suddnely they gain the ability to attack everything within range? What? Dammit, Hugo, you should have done that four seconds ago! If you had done it then, you wouldn’t be *dead*.

I still think making “Withdrawal” an option by increasing the cost so it sucks up the entire AP pool to move 2 hexes, without movement getting cancelled on a hit, would go a long way towards making that situation in general feel less odd because it moves people out of range without turning fleeing into an instant death-spiral. There’s a reason most systems that have attacks of opportunity limit them to a certain amount per round, its exactly to avoid this sort of situation, where the trick to taking down some foes is to “Opportunity fish”

If we’re worried about making the game less tactically interesting, it might be a cool change to make it so that the attack of opportunity always hits if someone triggers it. At that point you’re making decisions about what you’re sacrificing for movement, and if its worth it, and if someone flees they’ll get a sword in the back but could still stumble away.

But hey, maybe it’s best if it works this way. It’s still a great system. It just feels odd to me.
—

Incidentally, it’s an interesting point about max fatigue units ceasing to influence the battlefield. I’d reckon that would be a very good thing? If someone is exhausted from wearing heavy armor and mail, they’re not going to be able to nimbly retaliate at every opening. They’re going to be too busy not keeling over from heat-stroke. It makes sense that they wouldn’t offer as much control over their zone because armor limits fatigue. Also makes heavy armor and interesting trade-off. You get more protection but you’re also giving your enemy more mobility.