I have been studying a lot of combat systems across various genres of games, and from those that I have seen, having unsafe attacks seems to be quite a common staple. But I am not sure why? I think I understand the concept/purpose of unsafe attacks as a mechanic in a combat system; it essentially boils down to a risk vs reward system right? In order to balance an attack and prevent it from being overpowered the risk of it being unsafe is introduced, so if you get it right you reap a huge reward but if not you are hugely punished. In counter, an attack that is less risky reaps an equally less significant reward.

I suppose another way to pose the same question is, what effect would it have on a combat system if all attacks were made safe? For example would this make the combat more offensive/defensive focused as oppose to being an equal balance of both? Do games with such combat systems even exist?

I feel that adding a sprinkle of reality onto this concept may shed some more insight into why I find this mechanic slightly confusing. I am happy to be proven wrong, but my understanding is that in real life a skilled combatant (of any discipline) would never intentionally attack with a move that they know is unsafe, yet from what I have seen many games feature player characters with a plethora of unsafe attacks. Doesn't this go against the narrative that this is a skilled combatant? Another example is the basic jab; again happy to be proven wrong but my understanding is that the purpose of this is to create momentum for the attacker, hunt for an opening and be able to rely on this as the fastest and most safest attack in their arsenal. Yet so many games have jabs be unsafe on block. Why?

Hopefully I have explained my question in enough detail but if not please let me know what is missing and I'll be happy to add it. Thank you and looking forward to some insight on this part of combat systems.

in dota 2 and warcraft 3 u can even place the camera horizontally on the ground and the movement still accurately knows where u clicked, how is this possible?

my understanding is the normalized screen coords go from [-1,1] in both x and y directions and usually there's a perspective matrix which is to make things appear like they have depth by making vanishing points and a view matrix to move the camera and/or rotate it.

Right now, I am trying to code a survival game. The game needs a explosion fire effect that happens when the player fires a rocket from a rocket launcher and I am trying to code it. The fire is a illuminating object. Any recommendations to make it realistic?

I want a method to code a realistic engine plumes that behaves similar to the BE-3s or any solid rocket motor that has a gradient from transparent to blue and to yellow with the cool fluttering effect.

When creating a game, is it better to have complicated but interesting mechanics, or simple and understandable mechanics?

From a design point of view, I can understand that simple mechanics can be picked up easier, but complex mechanics allow for more depth and learning.

I'm making something with different mechanics for crafting, brewing, movement and a bunch more.

Should I be worried about overcomplication or not?

What benefits could there be in having higher/lower complication?

If there is a scholar article about this, it would also be a nice thing.

I'm working on a project which is a collectable card game, where cards gonna have very different abilities, for example as in Hearthstone - one card kills another card, another gives mana, another deals damage, another gives additonal damage, another doubles it's damage, so those are completely different abilites. But I don't know where and how to store these abilites. How is it made? I think it's not possible to store this information in the DB. Or is it?