[Discussion] Armor and Weapon Initiative Penalties: Where Did They Go and Should They Come Back?

from SorcererKing Forums

Unlike the Elemental titles, armor and weapon initiative penalties (or encumbrance from the earlier titles) in SK have all but disappeared with a few exceptions, notably bows.

Now we have a system of limited resources: not every trained unit is going to be able to equip a full set of Plate armor.  In LH for example, the player almost never thought of not training units with the best armor because the metal resource was almost always plentiful. With crafting, Platinum is rare and the player, by the end game, may have a handful of Plate pieces scattered throughout his or her armies.

So the question is: Are we the players missing the initiative penalties on heavier armors and weapons to further deepen the choices presented for tactical battles, or is the relative rarity of high-end armor and weapons delivered via the crafting system enough to satisfy our sense of tactical strategy?

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Reply #1 from SorcererKing Forums Top

I kinda think this is a major point of difference in the design of SK compared to earlier titles...does anyone else agree or disagree?

 

Reply #2 from SorcererKing Forums Top

I'd like to see initiative penalties for heavier armour.

Encumbrance is hit or miss for me.

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Reply #3 from SorcererKing Forums Top

I would rather a fatigue mechanic than an initiative penalty. Heavy armor doesn't necessarily make you move slower, but it will make you get fatigued quicker. In other words, each time the heavy armor character has a turn there is a penalty for initiative for the next turn. So as the battle wanes on, the heavy armor character becomes less and less effective.

I.e. battle initiative 20 to start. First round initiative down to 17, second round initiative to 14... third round initiative to 11... with a minimum initiative of say 50% of your initial initiative (10 in the above case). I'd even take it that once the initiative is less than half, there is no penalty anymore, i.e. in this case it would be initiative of 8 for the fourth round and the heavy armored character gets a few turns to act.

This can be done with any of the armors, say light armor the initiative penalty is 1 per round, medium 2 per round, heavy 3 per round...

I'm not sure if this mechanic sounds good, but in practice too complicated for the average player or just plain not fun, but I can see potential in bringing an alternative to combat. This mechanic can bring in abilities like endurance, giving the character less fatigue penalties... wash away fatigue, a reset of the characters fatigue to the maximum level again. Exhausted, curse an enemy unit to have more fatigue penalties. Weakness... shortness of breath, higher fatigue penalties.

Another thing about this mechanic it should be supported in the current engine. As I think I can mod this into LH.

Reply #4 from SorcererKing Forums Top

The beauty of Sorcerer King's economy in general is simplicity: the logistics/food/production paradigm eliminates the need for gold and deeper city management, yet still requires strategic choice. You can't have it all, but what you can have is very easy to understand, and your choices simple but significant.

As you said, the supply of crafting ingredients limits spamming great equipment onto every unit. In other games, it might add depth, but SK seems to be making a smart, conscious decision to streamline its strategic choices while preserving some strategic meaning of the choices.

In the cast of weapons and armor, the crafting system limits your choices enough that weight would be an extraneous mechanic for this game.

Reply #5 from SorcererKing Forums Top

But why have the initiative list during combat? This is one of the very unique and groundbreaking features of the FE series.