What you were talking about Willy is mostly covered by T1 which is in fact a guideline for a large number of fights here and does serve the purpose of balancing fights though I'd refute your claim that this balance is somehow 'skewed' and assume you have used the word incorrectly.
For example, combos are for the most part a bad idea, T1 is designed to cut up movements into individual attacks with cause and effect resolved before moving onto the next move. Most of the time your opponent won't be hit with your first move, which leaves you vulnerable if you haven't left your post open so your character can react to their failed move.
For example, if you post your character attempting a five punch combo that's what they're going to do, regardless of your opponent's reaction, if you include that your character will be ready to abandon their attack you may be ok in this situation, but it's more effective just to post your initial attack and then if your opponent is opened up in a way that makes further combo possible post the next attack in your next turn.
Interruptions are a pain in Arena, but they are the life blood of combat, that's where the most important rule comes in, logic. Only a certain amount of action is capable in a certain timescale and that is where the turn based aspect of T1 comes into play.
Preps work on the assumption that an opponent taking their time with their attack has more right in a combat between two opponents of roughly physical skill (IC, not OOC) to score a more critical hit. Guns in theory should work under this same theory, if you take a turn to aim your pistol you've essentially scoped in on a target and have more accuracy, your opponent is less likely to call bullshit on your insane accuracy and ninja-dodge your ass and instead take the hit as fair for not getting out of the way in the turn they had.
It's a fairly loose fitting guideline with a lot of personal interpretation, but there is no end-all system for combat and so far T1 makes the most sense to me.
as I said T1 is just a summary on what we do during RP battles and adding a turn-based game mechanic to them.
As for combos, it's exactly because breaking up the post into many tiny parts breaks the impact. Making only a few lines worth of response is a also pain in the eyes. Like any RP the battles should be similarly about writing a fun story.
Of course you shouldn't abuse combos and neither present them as if it's an autohit.
The key is on using future tense in the non-definite form.
"Cory attempts to grab Ken and while they are mid-air. Cory's planned follow-up involves shifting his center of gravity to perform a downwards screwdriver and nail Ken's head in the asphalt."
This is a combo yet it also effectively flows into one attack. That's one of the secrets to perform a feasible combo in RP battles.
Of course somebody detailing dozens of different attacks spread over minutes in one post is plain nonsense which would be pointless.
As for the 5-hit combo I disagree.
That's a great way to add some variety and complexity to physical battles so long the said attacks are performed under a short time and can effectively flow together.
"Kory delivers a punch to Ken's face and then plans to immediately follow up with a knee to the gut."
Or
"Kory sweeps at Ken's leg in order to take away his footing. His aim is to destabilize Ken and position him right into his second attack, a powerful forward thrust delivered by his right fist using Kory's entire weight."
In the latter case this form is also preferable because even if the first attack hits the player with "Ken" would respond in a way that his character is already on the floor. Thus robbing you of the occasion to deliver your second attack while mid-air.
This is the second large argument behind reasonable combos. It actually allows you to use the little time windows when needed instead of the opponent effectively cutting that off from you, either deliberately but generally it's because they just never imagined this to happen.
Trying to cling to the one attack per post limit at all costs is actually hurting the RP.
As for your idea with using "prep" to aim better.
It never works in my opinion. First off, the opponent usually crosses whatever distance lies between you and him until he can effectively attack under a single post unless it's extremely long.
Second, when you "prep" you aren't contributing anything to the battle thus you put the other player into a strange situation.
Instead I feel it's better if you include the prep along with your planned attack.
So if the other player does so many things it actually gives you a chance to attack then the other player knows exactly how to depict his response to the incoming shots.
Player A sets up a machinegun and prepares to shoot the agile ninja Player B who is say 40 meters away.
Player B posts that he runs straight for Player A to reduce the distance. But he accurately judges that under that time Player A would have the machinegun set-up and ready so he also describes how he moves from cover to cover to avoid the bullets.
That's a classic way how it goes.
Without it you only have a clusterfuck, for example the two players arguing that Player B can only move X meters before he finishes setting up the gun.
Simply put this only obstructs the narrative.
Another thing against an enforced "turn system" is that not all attacks are close to instant. Especially not when the fighters are super-fast.
One character may throw a grenade which has the fuse timer of say 4 seconds.
Then next attack is from an SMG which pretty much empties its 30-bullet magazine under 3 seconds.
Just because an attack came first you don't need to deal with it in that order. If a guy threw the grenade it doesn't mean you have 4 whole seconds of time mirror against him to attack.
Of course people usually do actions to avoid the first attack, too. But then they need to deal with the others.
A reasonable conduct if the slower first attack and its immediate faster follow-up is presented in the same post. Provided if the interval between these two attack is indeed short enough to justify this.
Another example of a combo.
@MelonHead I have nothing against "manipulating" the environment to gain the upper hand. The problem is when somebody does it in a rather underhanded way. And I don't mean this in-character but in the meta sense.
@Willy Vereb
I think that a good way to avoid these "coincidences" is to enforce a rule which requires any environmental destruction with beneficial results to be either intentional or situationally unavoidable. If the attack isn't aimed specifically to do collateral damage, then it will always do the minimal amount of it possible.
For example, the attacker may gain an advantage by striking a building support and collapsing said building onto their enemy. If there was no prior mention of the target being near the support, then an attack aimed solely at them will have no chance of hitting it - it is neither intended to strike said support, nor does the context of the previous posts make hitting it unavoidable.
If the target were to be standing right in front of it, then the support is within reach of the attack and will be affected by collateral damage, whether intended or not. Same if the attacker plans ahead and strikes from an angle that permits hitting the support.
That can work in case of the rocket example I said.
Albeit there are many other means. I read battle where the attacker determined how exactly will the debris fall, for example.
Still, I think such abuses aren't too difficult to spot if you are looking for them.
So the true answer lies on pretty much just spotting them rather than ignoring these, IMO.
