Boss fights: Rinse repeat?

[Kellzz]

lets start with the traditional MMO. Boss fights, you learn the fight, wipe a few times, then master the fight. the fun factor usually goes out the window at this point.

Since "bosses" in FOA are one time deals, if a group(s) happens to storm into a camp containing said boss, and wipe, if another attempt is not made within X hours, the boss packs up, moves somewhere else, and changes the way he operates in a fight.
Since FOA is about the dynamic world, this would fit right in, and add another level of challenge for the players.

But, one way players might adapt to prevent said boss from changing the way it fights, the first attempt, the players involved arrive in crap vehicles that cost next to nothing for them. they learn the fight this way and when they are ready to take it seriously, then they go get their expensive toys.


So perhaps the "boss" is given a list of tactics to choose from before and during the fight, therefore keeping the fight random, and preventing players from falling into the lather, rinse, repeat routine of boss fighting.

[Agamemnon]

A good healthy dose of ideas here...any others? would like to see some input from others on this one...

[Beovvulf]

How about making the weapons random for the boss and his minions.  If the boss and minions are engaged and win then allow the AI to reset their weapon configurations.   That way the same weapons are not seen the next time so strategy based on the first encounter may not work at all.

When the boss moves make the terrain a factor in that he relocates to different terrain.

[Helphyre]

I agree with what Kellzz is getting at here. Major bosses should only be a one time kill. And it would be great for their tactics to change. Ie when they load they randomly select from a given list of tactics, and from that tactic a set of equipment that matches the tactic.

For example. Boss loads and selects from 1)hit and run, 2)balanced, 3)moderatly aggressive, 4)in your face. Once the random roll selected on they would then select from a preset equipment. If the roll selected "hit and run" then the mob would load with long range missles or long range weapons and more stealthy armor/accessories. Or if "in your face" was selected then they would pick heavy armor and short wange items either missles or cannons. This would mean that players would need to be a little more well rounded when going into battles then preparing for a fight where you know the tgt uses missles, so you load up on jammers and anti-missle equpiment.

Not all bosses would have all tactics. If the lore behind a boss is that they are a brutal close combat fighter then they would not have the random options of "hit and run" or "balanced". Some bosses might be assigned to only be "moderatly aggressive". Also bosses might be know as missle specialists and no matter what their build would select from either long, medium or short range missles primarily.

Obviously, this would not apply to all the NPC tgt's. The everyday spawning/grinding type would have their set tactics and eaquipment. (We dont want the DEV's spending all their time coding a handfull of mech bait.)

Finally, what my idea might be more suited to, and what I am more interested in is semi-bosses that do need to respawn. These random tactic/equipment selections could be coded for a small group of semi-bosses there-by helping to keep the game interesing. These might be best for small, repeatable quests or respawning guards to certain areas. Again great topic Kellzz hopefully some of this stuff get coded eventually.

[Shadow Star]

Also remember.

Lets just say Capt. Johnson got Stomped last time through. You decide to investigate said area again to see if any new activity is around. Yes, Johnson is gone, but good old Lt. whatever got a field promotion, and now you got a new boss to contend with, and he will be very much different than the previous.

[Kellzz]

But if capt. Johnson wins, then Capt. Johnson should know better and adjust his fighting style and weapons (great idea Beo) to prevent the same group of people from picking up on his style.

[Apoc_Master]

Unless Captain Johnson is an idiot, but a lucky idiot

-//The Nice Guy//-

[Kellzz]

The rinse/repeat cycle can be applied to more than just boss fights. Sieges also encounter this issue. Take the battlegrounds in WoW. The first few months, people went about attacking randomly with no efficiency what so ever. Now, there is a set way of doing things. You could essentially break each BG down and put it into a flow chart. do this and that, while that is true, do something, else do that, etc. This is where the word "Grind" is so prevalent. Changing the layout of a city, or how each building responds to fire will keep players on their toes. City A was razed the other day. Well 5 months later the city is built back up, but now has improvements as the residents have taken into consideration what they experienced 5 months ago. That Lukron outpost? Now belongs to the genomans. But having seen how the Lukron build, they have learned additional things about architecture and have applied it to several structures.
Therefore when players encounter the genoman outpost, what used to work before, now has reduced effect, forcing the players to go back to trial and error.  (That organ inside your skull, does more than just tell your fingers to mash the 4 key over and over)



I understand that this requires a lot of effort from the programmers, but... since the world is to be dynamic... 

[Kreator666]

In all MMO, there are these out of proportion end game raid bosses that perform a near static combat tactic. Well as Kellzz said once you have figured the paturn then the boss is reduce from a dragon to a kitten. One thing that made me quit WoW (ages ago when cap was still 60) is that you "had" to download tons of add-ons like CT_raid and CT_BossTimer to be able to do raids and not wipe. I remember the final boss from the first 40 man (Molten Core) raid. With these addon you would get a message on your screen letting you know 5 sec in advance that the boss would perform this or that attack so you had time to run out of range before the massive aoe attack or knockdown. Imagine the boss seing all his enemy counter is every moves like WTF !!!

Would FOA go beyound all the competition ? I sure would like so  
But there must be reason why big studios like Blizzard and others couldnt (maybe just wouldnt ?) pull it off ?
Like it was pointed out these features are time consuming human ressources wise and when you dont have hundread of employees then idk...but lets keep high the spirit !  

Having variable tactic sure would make boss semi-boss more flesh and bones (well abductors and joints )
I like the idea of ramdom (well ramdom from a range of predenined loadouts). Could imagine bosses like those name mech you had to destroy in missions in the MW games, they were kind a elite mechs but still mechs just likes you (i have nothing against a gigantic thing packing and incridible amounts of weapons too. Things like those death star looking dropship in MW4 what are packed with ppc and lasers.). Would be nice if, in the devs hangar or mech lab, they could see the boss specs are fill its weapons slots then save a couple fits for the random tactics/weapons idea.

Regarding the moving npc mine-boss it would be nice. Imagine you have a missions to eliminate a rogue agent and his band (random escort ?) that are disloyal to their mother faction. You would get general location but would have to scout him out first (could stay at a location for some time then if he havent been slain by that time he moves to his next location ( could have 5 different locations, loadouts and tactics (different AI "personality") for 125 possibility