Eternity Graze is a terrible mechanic

[111111111]

In terms of attack outcomes, I think there is very little benefit for graze to even exist. If it was removed I think it would be fairly easy to re-balance numbers to (josh sawyers fav word) balance it again.

Additionally at least when in game you never really feel satisfied when you graze.

You never have that moment (at least for me) where you are like, "Thank god that grazed!" compared to something like a critical or a backstab.

Instead you would just be like damn i wished that was a hit instead. For me, it just feels like another cluttering mechanic to keep track of like "Percent conversion of miss to graze". Sure, the word is self explanatory but is it really necessary to the game?



I don't think removing it would change my experience in the slightest in both Pillars.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

You never have that moment (at least for me) where you are like, "Thank god that grazed!" compared to something like a critical or a backstab.

Instead you would just be like damn i wished that was a hit instead

CC

 

[Jvegi]

I don't think removing it would change my experience in the slightest in both Pillars.

I don't think removing both Pillars would matter much tbh.

 

[Butter]

You never have that moment (at least for me) where you are like, "Thank god that grazed!" compared to something like a critical or a backstab.

No shit. A graze is worse than a regular hit.

 

[111111111]

You never have that moment (at least for me) where you are like, "Thank god that grazed!" compared to something like a critical or a backstab.

Instead you would just be like damn i wished that was a hit instead

CC

CC as in crowd control?

not sure what you mean but I still think it wouldnt matter

 

[Infinitron]

Colony Ship has grazing. Vault Dweller How do you feel about this

 

[111111111]

You never have that moment (at least for me) where you are like, "Thank god that grazed!" compared to something like a critical or a backstab.

No shit. A graze is worse than a regular hit.

But why even bother with that?

You could just re-tune miss rate to be a little higher and increase damage per hit to account for the removal of graze. For a player it provides vague feedback.
Am i doing something right with grazes or no?

At least with miss and hit its clear which one is good or bad

 

[Butter]

You never have that moment (at least for me) where you are like, "Thank god that grazed!" compared to something like a critical or a backstab.

No shit. A graze is worse than a regular hit.

But why even bother with that?

You could just re-tune miss rate to be a little higher and increase damage per hit to account for the removal of graze. For a player it provides vague feedback.
Am i doing something right with grazes or no?

At least with miss and hit its clear which one is good or bad

Why not make every attack a hit, with flat normalized damage?

 

[111111111]

You never have that moment (at least for me) where you are like, "Thank god that grazed!" compared to something like a critical or a backstab.

No shit. A graze is worse than a regular hit.

But why even bother with that?

You could just re-tune miss rate to be a little higher and increase damage per hit to account for the removal of graze. For a player it provides vague feedback.
Am i doing something right with grazes or no?

At least with miss and hit its clear which one is good or bad

Why not make every attack a hit, with flat normalized damage?

The reason is because making ever attack a hit makes fights extremely predictable for every action. The reason misses exist in a turn based or rtwp is to bring a certain element of risk or uncertainty into the fight. Having risk brings unpredictability into the game and makes it more fun in comparison to a flat line . Even though expected damage output might be same when using probabilities when using (hit/miss) vs flat, the unpredictability brings more life.


Graze doesnt acctualy do anything in that regard. Instead it actually bridges the gap and lowers the unpredictability. Since graze is a bridge between hit and miss it actually lowers risk and makes fights more predictable but not as much as a flat amount.

 

[Butter]

You never have that moment (at least for me) where you are like, "Thank god that grazed!" compared to something like a critical or a backstab.

No shit. A graze is worse than a regular hit.

But why even bother with that?

You could just re-tune miss rate to be a little higher and increase damage per hit to account for the removal of graze. For a player it provides vague feedback.
Am i doing something right with grazes or no?

At least with miss and hit its clear which one is good or bad

Why not make every attack a hit, with flat normalized damage?

The reason is because making ever attack a hit makes fights extremely predictable for every action. The reason misses exist in a turn based or rtwp is to bring a certain element of risk or uncertainty into the fight. Having risk brings unpredictability into the game and makes it more fun in comparison to a flat line . Even though expected damage output might be same when using probabilities when using (hit/miss) vs flat, the unpredictability brings more life.


Graze doesnt acctualy do anything in that regard. Instead it actually bridges the gap and lowers the unpredictability. Since graze is a bridge between hit and miss it actually lowers risk and makes fights more predictable but not as much as a flat amount.

See, I don't even value unpredictability in this context. I think the point of miss/graze/hit/crit is simulation. In a real fight, some of your hits are going to be better or worse than others, without being outright misses.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Colony Ship has grazing. Vault Dweller How do you feel about this

I think it works well. I can't speak for PoE as I've never liked its combat system, but a combat system like AoD and CSG does call for graze mechanics to differentiate between 'almost hit' rolls and 'not even close' rolls. As a bonus it also helps differentiating precise attacks and firearms such aimed shots and rifles from bursts, double- and triple-shots, SMGs, etc.

 

[The Great ThunThun*]

Graze is an unimaginative man's substitute for fast and dangerous battles. The real culprit is HP bloat.

 

[santino27]

You never have that moment (at least for me) where you are like, "Thank god that grazed!" compared to something like a critical or a backstab.

Instead you would just be like damn i wished that was a hit instead

CC

CC as in crowd control?

not sure what you mean but I still think it wouldnt matter

In Pillars, grazing with application to CC abilities or spells allows that effect to still land, just for a reduced duration. That's a big improvement over an outright miss, which is, I assume, what rusty was talking about.

 

[111111111]

Well if it is simulation experience then yes I think it is appropriate to have graze, but I think in terms of fun and clearness i would prefer a grazeless system simply because my satisfaction of ever landing grazes is simply neglegible.

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

People need to understand a Miss in D&D terms can mean a number of thing, including a low hit graze, the enemy parried, blocked, you flat out missed or even you hit the opponent but it did nothing damaging. Graze is pointless IMO, because Miss covers it pretty much and the unpredictability is greater. It's not satisfying to win combat by grazing shots. Just hit or miss, but use your imagination with what miss implies (it's not always swinging and hitting the air).

 

[Vault Dweller]

Colony Ship has grazing. Vault Dweller How do you feel about this

I think it works well. I can't speak for PoE as I've never liked its combat system, but a combat system like AoD and CSG does call for graze mechanics to differentiate between 'almost hit' rolls and 'not even close' rolls. As a bonus it also helps differentiating precise attacks and firearms such aimed shots and rifles from bursts, double- and triple-shots, SMGs, etc.

Vd if you need graze, that means chars have too much HP. You want players to feel that you are whittling enemies down.

Do you really think characters had too much HP in AoD? CSG is no different.

 

[Cross]

For me, it just feels like another cluttering mechanic

It is clutter, because there already is a more elegant way to convey the concept of grazes: through damage ranges. E.g. having a damage range of 2-7 and hitting for a 2 is essentially a graze.

 

[ArchAngel]

Well if it is simulation experience then yes I think it is appropriate to have graze, but I think in terms of fun and clearness i would prefer a grazeless system simply because my satisfaction of ever landing grazes is simply neglegible.

Graze would only make sense from a simulation perspective if a single or two hits would bring down a target or cause seriuos injuries.
But since that is not how these games work graze is a stupid mechanic.

 

[passerby]

Graze was introduced mostly becuse some players hate to miss and demand each attack to do something. It's not suppossed to feel satysfying, it's suppossed to not feel dissappointing like a miss. It's supposed to replace misses to a larger degree than hits.

 

[Vault Dweller]

For me, it just feels like another cluttering mechanic

It is clutter, because there already is a more elegant way to convey the concept of grazes: through damage ranges. E.g. having a damage range of 2-7 and hitting for a 2 is essentially a graze.

Sure, grazing could be done via damage ranges if the range is wide enough, but that would make damage rolls too random, which in turn would make any damage resistance random as well. In our experience, tighter ranges like 7-10 or 10-14 work best, but the min damage is too high to be considered a graze. Since graze is not a direct hit by definition, it should be handled via to-hit chance by adding a small graze range between hit and miss.

 

[Neanderthal]

I'm not really bothered by grazes as a mechanic, it's just part of a scale that in my book must include failure, misses, and ideally has critical versions at each end.

The drama of dice rolling, and the mitigation of that through character building are what i like in rpgs. Dread the 1, and go wild for the 20 etc.

 

[Agame]

Graze was introduced mostly becuse some players hate to miss and demand each attack to do something. It's not suppossed to feel satysfying, it's suppossed to not feel dissappointing like a miss. It's supposed to replace misses to a larger degree than hits.

^ Exactly this.

Its part of the nu-game design school of "everyone is a winner, everyone gets participation awards, nothing matters because all choices lead to the same outcome", and its the reason POE is such a boring, bland and uninspiring POS to play. Unfortunately all game designers are being forced into this position of creating mechanics that always "feel good" and reward the player rather than taking something away or "hurting" the player.

Its no surprise that this design coincides with the current cultural trend of hipster/sjw "nihilism/nothing matters" philosophy. And of course when a game like Sekiro is released it is the anti balance, antithetical to this concept so you get games journos crying for easy mode. "Why cant everyone play the game without having to suffer and learn, why does it have to be so hard?" This is the rallying cry of these inclusive fake-gamer degenerates. The only games they can understand are walking simulators and novelty "art" games.

 

[Vault Dweller]

It's not about that (in my opinion). Look at it this way: you have a 30% chance to hit. You roll in 1-30 range, you hit. You roll 31-100, you missed. It doesn't matter if you roll 31 or 99, even though 31 is a very close call and 99 is that cross-eyed gunner from Spaceballs. You can say tough luck or you can create a graze range for close rolls for half the damage. Conceptually, it's no different than a critical range, so you'd have something like 1-5 (+ modifier) critical, 6-30 hit, 31-40 graze, 41-100 miss. This design won't make "everyone a winner" but will reward close calls in a reasonable way.

 

[Drakron]

Its different since there is a critical hit table with weapons often having different critical chances, grazing is not something you aim at but simply a participation award for not quite hitting it.
Its busy work as adds a unnecessary roll and another table, "grazing" damage would fall into the damage roll as you might hit the target but it simply didnt do much damage (aka, it was a grazing blow or shoot) and its another over-complication because its CRPG and we can do it as it brings nothing to the table except mechanical masturbation.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

I don't think the computer cares about having to make another roll.