Hi Everyone,

Im pretty early in this game, just finished up Paws on my way to Britain, but noticed in my very limited combat eperience that it seems to move very quickly and is nearly impossible to tell whats going on.

I currently have Iolo and Spark in my group only, but pretty much whenever we have come across an enemy so far the battle is over by the time I enter combat mode and I cant really tell who is hitting, being hit, etc. It looks like I can only set the Avatar to command mode in combat and so, by the time Im in combat mode and trying to decide who to attack, the battle is pretty much over.

Im not sure if this is just because the initial enemies are super easy (I think wolves or wild dogs) or if I need to change some settings or just learn how to manage combat.

Any thoughts or guidance would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks much!

Combat was pretty much an afterthought cause they spent all their time on the world sim. Rather than worrying about controlling them mid-battle, just keep them all well equipped. It's best to avoid missile weapons because you'll end up in confined spaces shooting each other. Set their AI to berserk mode so they don't run off or drop anything when wounded.

As the other commenter mentioned...combat is not a huge issue in the game until you get much further. It's largely AI based, which means you want to equip your party members well, train your party members' skills (Str/Dex/Com are the only ones that matter for your party members...the Avatar is the only one who really benefits from training up Int/Mag, and even then it's not THAT important so long as you rest up often enough to keep your mana pool at a comfortably high level), and hit [C] when Foes are around you so that your party members can automatically start hacking and slashing away.

Combat mainly deals with hitting [C]. Hopefully nobody dies. Later on, there will be enemies that deal A LOT of damage (e.g., dragons, golems, stone harpies), and some party members may die if they're not geared in good armor or don't have good Dex/Com stats. Usually, in those cases, I would overcome those difficult enemies through the use of magic or items. Opening a backpack pauses the game, and allows me to do things like putting powder kegs next to a difficult enemy and causing it to explode, or cast a particularly powerful spell to attack a Foe or heal party members. (you can also use yellow potions or bandages on party members in mid-combat as well) You may also find glass swords, which do a crapload of damage...once...before it breaks. Which can be useful for defeating particularly powerful Foes.

Regarding missile weapons, I actually find a magic bow and arrows to be a particularly powerful combination, even with party members with bad Dex/Com stats (they just need high Str to carry a decent number of arrows). But missile weapons that EXPLODE, like Firedoom staffs, burst stars, or burst arrows, are awful. Avoid them at all costs. The splash damage from those tend to annihilate everyone around the targeted Foe...which tend to be your party members. While an errant arrow or bolt CAN accidentally hit a fellow party member, that doesn't really happen that often.

Friendly fire happens extremely often, burst ammo or no. It really is a liability.

Thank you all for the responses. Its a little disappointing that combat isnt really a part of the game that the player controls and is involved in but I guess thats the direction they are going.

I appreciate all of the information and will proceed accordingly. It seems its pretty easy to find reasonably good armor and equipment in little hidden spots here and there so hopefully keeping everyone well equipped is not much of an issue.

Im not really sure yet which weapons will explode or not -- and based on how fast things seem to happen in combat it will be somewhat hard to tell who is taking friendly fire. But for now I will stick with bow & arrows and such and see how that goes.

Im still just in Britain/Lord British's castle so havet yet had much in the way of combat.

Thanks again!

Yeah it's disappointing in one sense, but they did manage to produce one of the most detailed and memorable game worlds of all time. Not so bad, all in all. If they'd gone in the other direction I doubt the game would be as well remembered today.

You make an excellent point!

Afterthought or not, they could've at least kept it turn-based. That in itself would've been an upgrade IMO.

If that had been the only change, it would have been a thousand times worse. The last thing you want to do with bad combat is make it slower.

I disagree/

ultima 6 had the best combat in the series (though that's not saying that much), and by making it real-time, Ultina 7 threw that away.

If they had "made it slower" by making the combat turn-based, it would no longer be bad combat, but would actually be decent.

The series actually has a history of this sort of thing. For example, Ultima 3 has the best and most balanced class system in the series. (Ultima 4's isn't well balanced, and Ultima 5 has only 4 classes with the only real difference between them being MP.) Or there's the inventory system, which in 4 and 5 basically got out of the way, not limiting what you can carry, but then Ultima 6 added limits and made it sonewhat cumbersome, and Ultima 7 made inventory management even worse. Or food, which gradually became something you don't need to worry about (beating Ultima 6 without eating is feasible), until Ultima 7 ruined it by requiring manual feeding of characters (meaning you have to interact with the cumbersome inventory) or else they'll take damage.

It would absolutely not improve anything on its own.

Turn based is only good when you have meaningful options to weigh before acting. Without that, it's a chore.

Ultima 6's combat, in particular, would be good enough and definitely better than Ultima 7's.

It's really sad to see how much the series regressed in many ways over the years, even though it did advance in other ways.

suddenly i'm wishing Ultima 8 had had party members. its combat could have been even worse than 7's. i'm thinking of party members running around, stepping on exploding mushrooms, killing themselves and/or others.

It already is worse in U8 because all you do is spam click on an enemy for like 10 minutes until it dies, or if you're smart, you just run past enemies because you get nothing out of engaging in battle.