Malachi left a comment on the Myth Busters post this morning and while I was in the process of answering it I realized that my reply was long for a comment, and decided that it would make a decent post by itself.
Here’s Malachi’s original comment:
I’ve heard a lot about the various katana. I don’t know how much truth there is to any of it except for the current Musashi jump attacks requiring more timing. Besides that there is suggestion that certain weapons have a much faster forward slash or faster comboing. I don’t see that so much as I see different animations that may appear faster or slower. Maybe I’m the one missing something but I thought the scripts in the katana were all pretty identical.
My somewhat long-winded reply is probably boring to most, though it does help somewhat to explain some of the differences that people see when jump-slashing with different swords, and why the Musashi has a reputation for being different in that regard:
Popularity: 33% [?]
I sat down for an hour one nite with Wave, Oxide, Cursed, and HoD and experimented with Straight Razor’s Iaido Reflexes Trainer. The trainer listens for “Sword Bullet” and gives you a reaction time expressed as a percentage to say how long it took you to hit and announces the person who hit it first.
The Iaido Reflexes Trainer I was using had sit pads for four people so I dunno if distance makes a difference for the Sword Bullet to travel but my distance was the same for each test.
I did 30ish or 40ish hits with each of the four blades. Unfortunately I was too stoopid to write down *all* the numbers but I remember the average reaction times to hit from ready.
Time Dilaton: 1.00
Ping Sim: 65ms to 70ms
Cursed: 87%ish (0.13 second reaction)
Wave: 89%ish (0.11 second reaction)
Oxide: 91%ish (0.09 second reaction)
HoD: 93%ish (0.07 second reaction)
Now yah, Second Life isn’t exactly the most reliable thing and scripts can lie but from ready to slash HoD was faster than Oxide was faster than Wave was faster than Cursed *every* single time.
Like the Iaido Reflex Trainer has sit pads for four people…we did another test with multiple people using different blades. Straight Razor, Djinn Holiday, and I sat down for a ready to hit test. When I used Cursed I lost *every* single time. When I used HoD I won *every* single time.
Now with that said like Cursed and Wave are slower for tanking but seem a *lot* faster on run to slash than Oxide and HoD. Sure, all the devs say the scripts are 95% the same, but my fighting style says the blades attack differently.
Course I said “my fighting style” cuz it could just be my fingers causing the blades to react differently. =^.^=
I have not seen this trainer, but what a fantastic idea! And it sounds like it was useful here.
I admit to being very surprised by the numbers you came up with, though. I would not have ever thought to have seen these numbers, nor so consistently.
I would love to purchase one of these, where can I get it?
Do the swords use the sword bullets to detect hits? I know that kicks do not use bullets, and I thought I had heard from someone that the sword bullets were only there for compatibility with other systems, and that they use the same mechanism for kicks to detect slashes with each other. I’m pretty sure I have dueled in an area with “no rez” where I was getting popup errors saying it couldn’t create object “sword bullet”, but I was still able to damage my opponent.
If that is the case, then the data from the trainer doesn’t necessarily mean anything, because those bullets are not being used to determine hits. The swords definitely “feel” faster or slower to me, and Aimee’s data is pretty much the order I would give them by how they feel. But that “feel” comes from the attack animation, the blood animation, and the sound effect. If you think about it, none of that needs to have anything to do with when the hit is actually determined by the code to be a hit or a block.
It seems like I’m arguing that there actually isn’t a difference, but really I don’t have a strong belief either way.
As for the reason for the difference in Aimee’s data, is the code from entering the key press event handler to creating the sword bullet identical on all swords, or could some of them execute a few extra commands that delay the creation? Or could something else in the script cause the event handler to be slightly delayed in executing?
Oh, and in response to the original post, I would go farther than just saying the Musashis have a reputation for being different with jump slashes. I can demonstrate exactly how they are different, and produce a successful or a failed jump slash on request every time.
The code is slightly different for each sword, in order to give each sword slightly different characteristics and “feel”, but even across the range that Aimee indicates above there is only a 0.04s difference between the extremes. That’s not generally going to be enough to “make or break” any single fight, especially when you take into account the other various factors introduced by the Second Life platform itself.
I understand, and I believe you. I was just trying to explain a bit about why you see such differences when, if you were to look at the code responsible for that action in all of the swords, you would see nothing that accounted for it.
I don’t want to get too much into C:SI-specific code, I’d prefer to use generalities, but suffice it to say that there is a relationship strong enough that the timing of the sword bullet is intimately tied to the timing of the damage.
Having said that, there are various factors that such training tools simply cannot account for, and while they are clearly a useful tool for their intended purpose, they simply cannot provide 100% accurate data at all times.
Ahas, you can get one from :: Neko Bake :: my shop in Tokugawa right across from Eyana’s…almost next to yers (look to the right facing yer entrance). Only L$100 for the one with no sit pads for reflex and jumpslash training. IM Straight Razor for the one with the 4 sit pads if you want to have one that has a fixed distance from where yer standing to the pole. ((lets hope yer spam filter doesn’t eat this tor post LOL))
Oh and as far as 0.04 seconds making or breaking a fight…believe me…it does. As you know Wave is my primary blade and I use it most of the time but when I go up Meludo and his Nagi I almost always have to use HoD to kill him. Really. No other blade is quick enuf from block to slash for me to reliably sneak my hits in.
Same fighting style, same fingers, same taps, same timing…he’ll *annihilate* me if I use Cursed, he’ll almost always beat me if I use Wave, but I can routinely beat him if I use HoD.
Then again different blades suit different styles…I need my trusty Wave to beat Djinn! ROFL
@Aimee -
I will have to defer to your judgment on this, as my own combat skill is far below yours. Logic tells me that there must be more to the story, as average human response times are far greater than that, but there’s no arguing a healthy success rate like yours.
Hmmm… About the training equipment…
I was unable to find it on SL Exchange, and I had considered linking to it. That does remind me that I’ve been meaning for quite some time now to do a post on (and provide links to) C:SI community-created training tools and gadgets. That works best, of course, when there’s a blog or other website to link to
Thanks for the info, I’ll definitely check it out.
Oh right I know that reaction time is usually 0.15s to 0.30s. I’m not saying I can react in 0.04s I’m saying that my attack simply seems to be going off 0.04s faster with the same reaction time. Of course network stuffs and ping can make that 0.04s advantage useless but still…just going from experience.
So like block to slash hits I *can’t* land with Cursed I *can* land with HoD. And run to slash hits I *can’t* land with HoD I *can* land with Wave. LOL
I think that made sense.
Oh and Straight hasn’t put the Iaido Reflexes Trainer up on SLX…I should poke him about that!
Right, right. But with less well-trained and less well-conditioned people, the variance in reaction times is also typically greater than 0.04 on average. I suspect the fact that you can even notice is that your reaction times are faster *and* more consistent.
I think…. Made sense in my head, at least.