Basics of combat with a bear
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Last week I promised to write about the combat system in our game, and as promised here it is. The player commands the settlers to attack an enemy and then the settlers and the enemy fight, similar to how it’s done in RTS games. In our case the enemy is a jungle bear. 
The bear has different two attacks, one bite attack and a stomp attack. The bite attack works as in your standard RTS game, where it does damage to one settler when the bear bites the settler. This attack cannot be dodged. The stomp attack however can be dodged. The bear will stand up on its two back feet and scream a little, and then proceed to stomp with its front feet in the ground, dealing damage to all the settlers within the area of effect (AOE). This mix of dodgeable and undodgeable attacks might seem inconsistent and may be a bit confusing for the player, and yes that is a valid thought. During the first iteration of the bear’s attacks the player could actually dodge all of the bear’s attacks. We discussed having a similar approach to combat like Dark Souls have, i.e every attack has a clear windup and every attack can be dodged if done at the right moment. However we felt like this created an unwanted huge amount of micro managing during combat. Since the player controls several settlers, needing to move them out of the way for every attack, then commanding them to attack the bear, and then move them again e.c.t. made the combat feel a bit annoying. We didn’t want that high level of micro managing that this created, but we didn’t want the player to be totally passive during combat, so we decided to make a mix of these. To indicate that the stomp attack actually is dodgeable a red ring appears during the animation, showing the area of effect, giving the player a visual hint about the attack being dodgeable. I am sure this will be iterated on later down the line when we’ve done some more testing. It is possible that this AOE ring hint might be too much of a hint. It is possible that players will understand that this is an AOE attack without the ring. Next time I’ll write a little bit more about the combat, and how equipping the settlers with different gear and how that affects gameplay.
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