Duel

DUELING
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Note! You can duel only in places where dueling is allowed such as boxing gyms etc.


Short description: Dueling is meant for player-to-player contesting or player killing over life-and-death disputes.



Long description
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When two skilled fighters meet in personal combat, their contest runs far deeper than simple attacks, blocks, or traps. If a fighter dodges to his left when his opponent throws a right punch, or ducks when his opponent throws a body punch, he's at a distinct disadvantage. The subtle patterns of attack and defense create temporary advantages or disadvantages for those involved in a duel. Leaping over a low sweep is a great way of avoid getting hit... but what if you guessed wrong and your opponent is going higher? 

Game mechanics of dueling differ from normal combat in the sense that they are much more grittier and allow chance to play a much bigger part in the duel outcome. For example, successful attacks cause a lot more damage in dueling than in normal combat, making not getting hit by moving a very important issue. The mechanics have been designed with a little bit of 'endgame' in mind so competence in dueling clearly favors higher player levels. Lower level players can also participate and train in dueling, but to be honest there is a glass ceiling which makes lower level players tend to stay more as good amateurs and semi-pros whereas the higher level players can become true pros and champions. However, it is not at all impossible for a lower level player to defeat a much higher level player in a duel if he is fortunate. So it's better not become too arrogant even if you're the champ! For example, for every dueling attack there is a fixed 5% chance to fumble or crit. This fixed chance is not based on player level. So things may go wrong even with the higher level player. To make dueling feel a bit more sportier and allow room for benchmarking, tuning and training of your dueling style, the most interesting rolls are shown to you.

Many player-vs-player systems in grinding games have a tendency to become 'broken'. To prevent dueling from breaking in the same way, most of the variables affecting duel outcomes are 'fixed' based on your race stereotype and your experience level. This means that if you are a brownie, regardless of how much strength augmenting equipment you are wearing to a duel, you're still never going to be matching a firbolg in strength. From most parts the only game technical variables left into player hands are the number of his hit points and endurance points. And even while they are important, they do not guarantee victory. So dueling makes this kind of race and experience level based 'equalization' so that it would be harder to break and outcome would be a result of the other player being better in the actual act of dueling, which will be explained in this and other dueling related help files.

Duels don't have to be fought to the death - in fact there are lots of people that would rather not get killed if it's possible to surrender and live. Some other common conditions for duels include fighting to first blood, fighting until someone is wounded, 25% or 50% loss of hit points, and any number of alternatives including betting money on the winner. With later implementations of dueling it becomes possible to participate in tournament ladders and win championships in one's own weight division.



Instructions & Commands



To learn dueling, go to your nearest location that allows dueling. Chances are you need to go to Vaerlon fight hall. Once there, you may test out these commands as they are introduced in these instructions.

There are two important things to dueling: Movement and attacking. Defending is contained in the movement. In dueling you can fight on three levels: low, center and high. To change your current fighting level, try out: duel level high

Once you have chosen your fighting level, you may move to five different positions on that level: n, s, w, e and c. As usual, n is a shorthand for north, s for south, etc. c is a shorthand for returning to center of your current fighting level.

Try out:
#1: duel level low
#2: duel move n
#3: duel level high
#4: duel move n

So first you go low, and if you go n while being low, you tumble forward. Then you go fighting high, and if you go n while fighting high, you leap forward instead of tumbling forward. You can change your fighting level in combat freely. Note that changing position, as attacking, takes a little bit of time. This is where the size of your race affects a lot. You might catch a brownie change position three times before a firbolg changes it once. To speed up your movement in dueling, you might want to consider rigging your keypad so that your num keys make it easy for you to change level and position during combat.


There's another important aspect to movement. You and your opponent are battling in the same space. So if you are leaping forward while your opponent is crouching back, you are very far from each other, making hitting him very difficult. Then again, if both of you are crouching back at the same time, you are super close and hitting him becomes much more easier. Same applies to his attacks towards you. So by knowing this you may move tactically. Ideally, if you know where your opponent is going to move, you have an advantage. This makes proper movement an important part of defensive and offensive at the same time. On the other hand, if you're getting beaten, change your position to improve your chances of avoiding the attacks! Your enemy will probably follow you shortly, but at least you get a few seconds to think. Remember - both your speed of movement and attacking is based on your race so use any natural speed of your race to your advantage without mercy. If you want to doublecheck your opponent's position, use command: duel scan <name>, as in 'duel scan doromo'.
If you want to abort your movement, try: 'duel move stop'.

Type 'duel attack help' to learn about attacking. But you need to be in a fight hall to do it.