Tweaked momentum-based movement - Feedback thread v2

#bringbackmomentum

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I know it was not completely rolled back as I watched the dev stream, but it feels non-existent after the update.

To reiterate, I absolutely love this game and I get frustrated when everything is nerfed so much there does not feel like a challenge. Examples: Barrow King and Kinscourge are so easy to defeat now. This is using Star Metal Weapons and any of the DLC Flawless Epic Armor, and no buffs other than what is provided by the armor and only a thrall (no other clan members or players helping). This is also with standard CE server settings. No damage boost/reduction adjusted through changing server settings.

EDIT: I would prefer the momentum mechanic be a server setting that can be adjusted on private servers.

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Difficulty should come from toughness of enemies, not from the fact that player has both legs broken. Thatā€™s just artificial and not in the spirit of the game. Snappiness of movements is something that should stay a constant; and the challenge should come from the fact that, while an exile is tough, strong and nible - the enemies are tougher, stronger and more nimble yet. Iā€™m yet to check out the new adjustments, and will do in a few hours, but initial introduction of momentum-based movement was a simulator of Special Olympics. Not belittling the achievements and valor of SO participants here, but Iā€™m not in the game to feel myself one. :grin:

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Completely agree.

The game could be more difficult if the screen went black at random intervals during combat, but that wouldnā€™t make it better. Adding difficulty alone is not a sufficient argument for any changes.

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I have to agree, too. On the one hand, I like the goal of trying to make the game more ā€˜realisticā€™ in combat, but on the other hand, I still want the game to be fun as well.

Maybe tie the momentum-based movement to stamina? Full stamina = no momentum stutter, but say less than 50% stamina and the character struggles a bit to get started.
Stamina at 100% = use animation X
Stamina at 49% = use animation Y

Or maybe the momentum effect only occurs when in combat?
Not in combat = use animation X
In combat = use animation Y

Or combine them all so that Stamina at 49% or lower and in combat gets the full momentum slowing that we originally saw and incrementally improve it to now (tweaked version) when not in combat and 100% stamina?

For me, its the ā€œout of combatā€ momentum that is the source of discontent.

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Unless itā€™s under extreme stress, or maybe we have a potion in us, thereā€™s no reason for our characters to ever instantly run at full speed. What it feels like now is an actual move toward ā€œramping upā€ to full speed, which should follow a performance curve if weā€™re actually simulating real-world running. If weā€™re not, beyond the acceleration curve I would guess there need to be some slight adjustments for the feel of turning or abrupt direction-changing.

Well done, gang!

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As a PvE player, the changes as of today feel pretty much perfect. I can jump forward from standing, wall-grab when jumping off my base again, and navigate around my base when crafting without feeling like Iā€™m stuck in mud.

The game feels like Conan again!

Thanks for listening, Iā€™m really hopeful that the movement weā€™re seeing today is what sticks because this feels good and the new animations look good with it so far.

EDIT: BTW, if you decide to use separate values for PvE and PvP (as Alex mused on stream yesterday), Iā€™d recommend todayā€™s settings for the Official PvE servers.

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Yes, this. While Iā€™m happy with the newly adjusted movement values, the jerky pickaxe animation looks unnatural and still hurts my eyes even more than the continuous camera shake from before.

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Nope. This doesnā€™t make me happy. Take a look at the dodge roll. Running full speed and the second you turn into a roll, you instantly decelerate to crawling speed. Nobody at Funcom has ever done a flying shoulder roll before. It isnā€™t even hard to do for the average person. 5 min of slow roll practice, then start doing them from a fast walk, then jog, then at a runā€¦ I suggest on a lawn first.

Harvest is still just as jerky. Momentum still has slow starts, but once moving, it initially seems a bit better, when bumping thingsā€¦ hard to tell. I just know that dodge is brutally painful.

PLEASE confirm how much private servers will be able to control dodge and reset the agility perk back to what is was? I desperately want the dodge back exactly like it was.

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I plan on testing the modifications soon but from what I read Iā€™m glad youā€™re not removing the momentum based system. There were flaws but the general idea was exactly what the game needed, it merely needed some polishing and I reserve judgement for when I can take some time to play and test the changes.

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It seems to me that if this were real life, and these were our leaping and rolling options, weā€™d do it like this.
run ā†’ sprint ā†’ jump ā†’ roll, roll, run

Have you tried doing a roll off a jump? It seems like a much more natural transition from a run or sprint. From this, I hope Funcom will consider a jump-roll action from a sprint or in motion.

The current iteration of the momentum based movement is a thing of utter beauty! I can feel it was not reverted and the current acceleration process is actually much closer to realistic for a barbarian built like we all are, ripped muscle forged through combat! I LOOOOOOOOOOVE IT!

The dodge (although not changed) even feels better! :rofl:

I donā€™t know Funcom, but to me you have hit the sweetspot for momentum based movement!
All the new players I introduced to the game in the past weeks also use words like fluid, crisp and responsive.

KICK A$$ JOB GUYS!!!

:metal::smiling_imp:

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I like it overall. The only problem I have is with trying to look around while moving. If Iā€™m moving at full speed (with or without sprint) forward, I can turn pretty quickly and not lose speed. This part feels good. But, if Iā€™m moving diagonally forward, turning more than about 30 degrees to either side instantly loses all momentum. This is where it breaks. I should be able to easily look 45 to 60 degrees to the left or right and add the opposite diagonal to my forward motion without losing speed. My movement vector is barely changing here, if at all, so momentum should largely stay untouched. This is especially true giving that adding or removing a diagonal to forward motion doesnā€™t cost any momentum at all if Iā€™m not turning, and I can turn very sharply without losing any momentum if Iā€™m not moving diagonally. I think the easiest fix would be having forward diagonal movement follow the same momentum rules as forward movement.

That said, Iā€™m going to try turning up my fov. Iā€™ve also gotten some extra practice using the vanity camera while moving.

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Very happy and thank you for listening. Funcom addressed this pretty quick in my opinion :leg::+1:

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I would love a jump roll, but in RL, I only did jump rolls if I had to get over objects that were too long to jump. Row of bodies on the ground (Judo class), trash cans lined up in the school yard. That kind of thing. But my RL dodge rolls were never with a jump first. Always low to the ground.

In martial arts, losing contact with the ground is losing control. Those flashy jumping spinning kicks in movies are bad news in RL. So much more power if you keep contact with the ground and so much harder for the enemy to take you down.

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This is great! I havenā€™t had the time to fully test the changes yet, but I can finally:

  • climb my own stairs without falling off them
  • run through my doors without bumping into door frames
  • open the chest I want and not the one next to it
  • jump off the wall of my base and catch it, without having to stop before jumping off and approach the edge gingerly :stuck_out_tongue:
  • mine stone and chop wood at a decent clip, despite the hitch in the animation

I can still notice the momentum, but itā€™s not making me feel old and sluggish anymore.

Thatā€™s what happened to me when they introduced the momentum-based movement: it felt horrible at the beginning. After a week, I started getting more used to it, so starting and stopping didnā€™t feel so jarring, but I still had all the problems I listed above.

My long-winded point is, I get how you feel and itā€™s perfectly valid to offer that as a feedback, but I would also recommend giving it a few days to see if you still feel the same way.

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I donā€™t like the revert. The gap when you start to move and run needs to be bigger. It just needs to be in the middle of these two options you have shown us. The roll is fine for me, although would agree on just a slightly faster roll for the majority of the player base to be satisfied. Now the momentum is gone from running and slow movement in general.

The changes are in the right direction so thank you for that. One thing id like to ask is since this is a momentum based movement system why is there no momentum carried over when u dodge out of a sprint?

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Moving to the appropriate thread:

I wanted to thank you for your efforts and work on a quick resolution on the movement debacle.

Thank you taking our concerns in mind and being willing to adjust controversial mechanics.

I will have to put in some more time and potentially further detail my thoughts, but I jumped on for 15 minutes before having to head to work and I personally believe it is night and day better.

As far as standard movement goes, I have no criticism regarding walking/running and moving from crafting bench to crafting bench.

Admittedly I havenā€™t tried harvesting yet, but I assume the movement between nodes will be reflective of moving between crafting benches (i still donā€™t like what happened to the mining animation, but that is a separate subject).

Climbing and cliff jumping is much more like it used to be which is my biggest relief (once again, not much time so I do want to test further) but I no longer feel like I am committing suicide when I jump off a cliff anymore, I have my ability to explore and navigate back.

I do want to test on the jump some more also, but from what I can see, our jump returned to being a bit more agile as well which was one of the big issues that hurt climbing.

At this point, baring any further discoveries with further testing, I think the movement is in a good spot and I believe it doesnā€™t really need any further tweaking. I am curious as to what others have to say about it as well.

Thanks once again Funcom for considering our concerns and facilitating one of our favorite pastimes.

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Finally got to test the new tweaks, and I can say Iā€™m very pleasantly surprised. ^^ Well done tuning down the sluggishness. Now it feels almost perfectly comfortable. I donā€™t feel like Iā€™m recovering from leg fractures anymore. I donā€™t bump into things at the house when moving about. I can jump and, oh miracle, grab on a cliff instead of falling to my death (now, here, I notice that itā€™s still worse than pre-update, but a whole lot better than original post-update variant - I will give it some time to test and see how it feels, itā€™s hard to say with one cliff only). I finally feel nimble. Thank you for that. ^^

Now, I did say ā€˜almost perfectlyā€™, but the remaining things are quite minor.

  • ā€˜Sidewaysā€™ movement instantly kills the momentum; Iā€™m not sure whatā€™s the proposed way of glancing back while running (turning on vanity camera for a moment? thatā€™s quite an exercise for fingers), but I usually move diagonally, and at some point if I try to move sideways to have a glance back, I stop down not even to a jog, but to sidestep walking, and at this point, transition back into sprint is very noticeable - partly because it usually happens while Iā€™m running away from something big, scary and with glowing eyes, every moment counts. ^^
  • Harvesting animation is still not completely smooth; Iā€™m all right with slight slowdown in gathering (Iā€™m not even sure if itā€™s much of a slowdown in practice), but from pure visual standpoint, this hiccup looks a bit ugly.

But minor things aside, I would say that it feels like a great change that feels right. Thank you for listening to us malcontents. ^^

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