[Kameron8]

Note: This is extremely long, a TL;DR can be found at the bottom if you don't have that kind of time.

The new round-robin initiative system set out to eliminate gimmicky combinations revolving around teammates taking turns one after another before an enemy can react. In this category, it has unquestionably succeeded.

However, I feel as though the current system is too rigid in forcing people to take turns. In doing so, adding new creatures or players to the combat -- or K.O.ing a player/creature -- has implications on turn order that can feel both counterintuitive and unpleasant alike. Given enough understanding of the system, players can (and will, eventually) specifically avoid/prioritize downing specific enemies at times, based on what the net impact will be on the next turn's initiative order.

To explain what I mean, I've pulled a test 3v3 PvP battle from a different thread and tracked the initiative order of each round:

Teams:

Team 1: Uniformed Karatynn, Tal Zarok, Audacious Artificer
Team 2: Hoodie Wearing Leporidae, Allaina Rakuzaki, Quiet Armored Man

Beginning of Combat Initiative Order:

1. Tal Zarok
   
2. Hoodie Wearing Leporidae
   
3. Uniformed Karatynn
   
4. Allaina Rakuzaki
   
5. Audacious Artificer
   
6. Quiet Armored Man
   

This can be seen in the screenshot below:



Things begin to get problematic once players start dying. To highlight this, the following is the turn order once the 2nd fastest player, the Hoodie Wearing Leporidae, was reduced to 0 Hit Points and the turn rolled over:

Post-Death 2v3 Initiative Order:

1. Tal Zarok
   
2. Allaina Rakuzaki
   
3. Uniformed Karatynn
   
4. Quiet Armored Man
   
5. Audacious Artificer
   

This is shown in the screenshot below:



Why this matters: Compare the two turn orders from the turn before, and the turn after the Hoodie Wearing Leporidae was killed. Note that, because the game has cycled the initiatives upward, the following has just taken place:

• Allaina Rakuzaki will end up having two full turns before the Uniformed Karatynn receives his next turn.
  
• Quiet Armored Man will end up having two full turns before the Audacious Artificer receives his next turn.
  

Unless teammates can offset what's happening in some regard (which is not always possible, in cases such as Die Hard), players will find themselves suddenly being pseudo-double turned by one specific player on the enemy team. I don't need to provide examples to emphasize how incredibly quickly a full additional turn can become lethal -- it was one of the main reasons this change was implemented to begin with.

To further exemplify this quirk of the system at play, we can continue to look at the ensuing test fight. With unbalanced teams, the system once more shifts the turn order to make sure turns are being taken up until the very end of the round. This leaves us with a new turn, and new initiative orders:

2nd Round of Post-Death 2v3 Initiative Order:

1. Allaina Rakuzaki
   
2. Tal Zarok
   
3. Quiet Armored Man
   
4. Uniformed Karatynn
   
5. Audacious Artificer
   

Compare this with the last turn, and make note of the fact that:

• Allaina Rakuzaki will take a 2nd consecutive turn before Tal Zarok gets one.
  
• Quiet Armored Man will take a 2nd consecutive turn before Uniformed Karatynn gets one.
  

Thus far, Allaina Rakuzaki is thrilled that her teammate was killed off -- she's gotten two turns in a row where she can hammer random people twice before they can act. This mess of a back and forth once more shifts once the Hoodie Wearing Leporidae Die Hards. Below is the initiative that results from the now 1 HP player re-entering the turn order:

Die Hard - 3v3 Initiative Order:

1. Hoodie Wearing Leporidae
   
2. Tal Zarok
   
3. Allaina Rakuzaki
   
4. Uniformed Karatynn
   
5. Quiet Armored Man
   
6. Audacious Artificer
   

This is shown in the screenshot below, with the recently dead player taking the first action of the turn:



All at once, we have:

• The 1 hp, 4 Momentum player going first.
  
• Tal Zarok taking two turns in a row, before Allaina Rakuzaki can take one.
  
• Uniformed Karatynn taking two turns in a row, before Quiet Armored Man can take one.
  
  

In this circumstance, it's very unlikely that the 1 health, recently revived player will be in a position to offset the next enemy's turn. Depending on who's positioned where, the fight becomes a circus of ''Will this player go twice before me if I finish off the enemy? Will die hard potentially screw me over? Should I leave that guy at 1 health so our healer isn't hit twice by the Void Assassin before he can act?"

My Suggestion:
My suggestion is that we use the new turn order system at the beginning of combat, then only allow turn orders to shift in the event that a player uses Skip. Units that enter into combat midway through the battle (i.e. Summoned Youkai, Engineer bots) will take their turns all at once, directly after or before their creator. The only other instance where the turns would shift would be when a new player joins a fight late.

To better explain this suggestion, I'll use the same exact fight outlined above, but state the turn orders as though they were following the system with the changes I'm asking for. The fight begins the same:

Teams:

Team 1: Uniformed Karatynn, Tal Zarok, Audacious Artificer
Team 2: Hoodie Wearing Leporidae, Allaina Rakuzaki, Quiet Armored Man

Beginning of Combat Initiative Order:

1. Tal Zarok
   
2. Hoodie Wearing Leporidae
   
3. Uniformed Karatynn
   
4. Allaina Rakuzaki
   
5. Audacious Artificer
   
6. Quiet Armored Man
   

Just like last time, the Hoodie Wearing Leporidae is killed. Instead of spinning the losing team up a tier in initiative, we instead keep everyone exactly where they were:

Post-Death 2v3 Initiative Order:

1. Tal Zarok
   
2. [strike]Hoodie Wearing Leporidae[/strike]
   
3. Uniformed Karatynn
   
4. Allaina Rakuzaki
   
5. Audacious Artificer
   
6. Quiet Armored Man
   

The next turn, this will remain the exact same. Once the Hoodie Wearing Leporidae Die Hards, we don't bring the circus back into town -- we merely restore the revived back into the turn where she belongs:

Post-Die Hard Initiative Order:

1. Tal Zarok
   
2. Hoodie Wearing Leporidae
   
3. Uniformed Karatynn
   
4. Allaina Rakuzaki
   
5. Audacious Artificer
   
6. Quiet Armored Man
   

If done in this way, the only way a team could begin collecting their teammates for a 2, 3, or 4 member combination of turns is through killing off most the enemy team first. This, of course, is much harder to do since they can't use a 2, 3, or 4 member combination of turns at the start to accomplish this feat.

Due to the nature of how many things affect turns in this game, there's a very good chance I'm missing edge cases with my suggested revision. However, since I don't see any, I'll conclude with recommending we change the system so that it doesn't dynamically rotate players around based on deaths, revives, summons, and other mid-fight occurrences.

TL;DR:
The current system allows for combatants to potentially take two turns before certain other combatants can take one, depending on enemy death, summons, or resurrection. I recommend that the round-robin turn order be held mostly static once the fight begins, to avoid these shifts.