Normally, a staggering system wouldn't be overly hard to create, but I'm having trouble.
In the game I'm designing, you can attack as many times as you please and create a combo. I simply thought it would be more fun this way and I don't really like the idea of "attack 3 or 4 times and you have to wait 1 more second before you attack again, and by then the creature you're fighting will have already broken out of stagger".
I could have it so the longer something staggers, the quicker it recovers (like X% of the usual stagger time is eliminated for each X time you spend staggering)..but then 12 players would be able to stagger a boss the same amount of time 1 player would. I mean, I guess that wouldn't be all bad, but...I don't know, I imagine it would look a bit abnormal that one sword stabbing at you would stagger you for the same total amount of time as five swords, five spears and two daggers.

Any ideas or suggestions would be welcome!

Thanks!

EDIT:
I thought maybe I could have each weapon type has a specific amount of time the enemy spends staggering and a specific amount of 'decay' to that stagger time each hit. So 0.30 attack time and 0.45 stagger time with 0.03 delay is about 6 hits before the boss is staggering for less that 0.30 seconds. Eventually, you'll have 0 stagger time per attack.
Once you lose your combo (by either not attacking for a few seconds, having the one you're attacking stop staggering, etc.) your stagger time is reset to the default value.
This would make weapons that have less damage and higher stagger better in team combat because your allies can attack more, even if they have 0 stagger time (because you'll still stagger the enemy even if they aren't).
It still has to be very delicately balanced...

I think this staggering system you have in mind would only be benifit to certain attack combos. Staggering could be in the technique ability. Pretty much a paralyse or poison stupper and then slam the creature with a two, three, or four hit combo.

A game on facebook comes to mind that uses a stun spell that stuns the player for 3 seconds which limits the opponent from using his or her weapons or spells until the stun effect wears off. If you time the effect just right you can gain more ability points to gather up and attack your opponent with two or three attacks in a single combo, which stuns the player from using his or her spells.

During this stun phase each players can use his or her normal attacks but are defensless using spells.

Timing and hit ratio and patience needs to be calibrated just right so you don't have two players staggered and can't move for X amount of seconds or minutes. The game would get real boring and quickly and would irritate players fast.

Sorry, Ghostknight, but I'm not really sure what you're suggesting...maybe that I should make a skill that stuns for 3 seconds or something?

I think I've got the staggering system down after some more thought, now I might ask around in Math and Physics for some help balancing.

Thats okay. I have reread what I wrote and I will someday rearrange what I typed up to make some sense even to me and its to late right now to do such a thing anyways. Which at the time it had. But sorry you didn't understand.
Hope you find the answers your looking for. Sorry it wasn't much help.

Keep up the great work.

Counter-stagger moves? Moves which are a) specific counters to staggering attacks and b ) can only be used when already staggered and c) cause the target to become staggered instead. The existence of such moves means that stunlocking a foe becomes a risky prospect.

Visually these kinds of moves could be represented by opportunistic grabs, pulling the staggering character back onto balance and throwing the other character off balance in the process.

Hmm,
The game is an RPG and the main problem is that the NPCs and bosses will be getting permanently combo'd by players...
I'm thinking every weapon type has a specific:

• Attack time
• Stagger time
• Stagger 'decay'The stagger decay is subtracted from the stagger time every time you attack, so each weapon time has X attacks before their attack time is higher than their stagger time (the thing they're attacking breaks stagger before they finish another attack).
  
  I guess I kind of explained that in the thread...oops, I forgot... oh well, I already spelled it out again, might as well leave it.
  That is a good idea, though. I have a few ways of breaking stagger for bosses mostly, since they'll be the ones with the most trouble (players aren't going to be fighting each other and bosses aren't going to be repeatedly attacking players, anyway).
  
  It's still going to be a hassle to balance each weapon, but I think I'll manage.
  
  Thanks for the ideas and help!
  
  

The best stagger system I've seen is in the MMO mabinogi.

Essentially after an attack flows all the way through the enemy is tossed back just far enough to give both players time to select their next skill if either decide rush and use default attack. With skills set up to to form a rock paper scissors system.

The game also punishes you harshly for not using the rock paper scissors system, you can only take a couple hits at best.

Thanks for the clarification, it did actually help put some context to the thread.

Anyway, it seems to me that part of the issue with the system you are considering at the moment is that it is just too damned easy to stagger someone. Staggering an opponent is a useful tactic, so why not make it something that can affect your whole build and attack strategy, rather than being a race to see who hits first?

What if you used a system of 'balance points' - every character has a number of balance points which regenerate at some rate. Each weapon has a balance damage effect, which reduces the target's balance by some amount on hit, and by a decaying amount on subsequent ticks.

If a creature's net balance 'income' is negative (i.e balance damage outweighs balance regeneration) then the character is staggered. If balance reaches zero, the creature falls over, and must spend some time getting up - further balance damage is ignored until the character is upright again and balance points are restored to maximum. This puts an upper limit on the amount of time a creature can be staggered - eventually he will either recover naturally, or fall over.

To make things more interesting, you could have weapons do balance damage to their user if they miss, making big heavy weapons with high balance damage a risky proposition, as they potentially expose the character to being staggered very easily on a well timed counterattack. Dodging might be a mode which allows you to ignore regular damage, but take a fixed amount of balance damage instead, so attempting to evade too many hits at once might cause a creature to become unbalanced.

I don't know, the Mabinogi system seems a little unoriginal and it might not work with a lot of players in one group, especially if the one you're attacking is constantly being shoved backwards.

That's a good idea..
I actually had a similar system.
Every weapon type has a 'pressure' per attack.
Pressure is applied to every unit, like the balance you suggested, and when they're hit, their 'Currently Applied Pressure (CAP)' is raised by X, depending on which weapon hit them.
If your CAP is above 0, you're staggering.
It is gradually reduced, and I tested this with very basic Game Maker coding at a speed of 30, so the following code happened 30 times per second:


If CAP > 0
{
CAP -= (Time Spent Staggering * 2)
}


So 30 times per second your CAP is lowered by the time you spent staggering multiplied by 2.
The longer you spend staggering, the quicker you recover.

But...I realized it might be difficult to balance that as pressure might begin getting less valuable as time goes by (maybe I'm mistaken?). Ultimately, it seemed like the decay and stagger time in flat-out seconds was much more simple and easier for players to understand, too.
So I settled on the decay system.

Boss fights are the focus of the game, mainly. Huge team fights against a single, badass boss was what really caught my attention in Tales of Symphonia (if you've ever played it, it's for GameCube) and it was what Zelda was always missing (challenging combat was nowhere to be seen in any Zelda game, besides maybe the REALLY old ones).
The bosses can either randomly 'break' out of your combo and instantly cast a huge spell that leaves you scrambling to get away in a 1-second time frame (more or less), teleport away and cast a spell, or just attack you and probably send you flying away.

They can also 'recover' where they lose all stagger and cannot be staggered for a few seconds to give them time to attack, cast, get away, teleport away, etc.
What triggers a break or recover is different for each boss, whether it be "lose 5% of your health to one combo and you'll get away," or "lose 20% health" or "be attack 35/45/50 times in one combo" or maybe a "2% chance to recover/break each time the boss is hit in a combo above 10 hits"?

Also, if they're attacked a hunk of times in one combo they'll occasionally trigger an "I've Had Enough!" where they lose all stagger and cannot be staggered for 5 or 10 seconds. This happens for players, also.

So there are consequences for staggering, and bosses are supposed to have a decent array of heavy spells and skills that can leave you lying on the floor, wondering where half of your health has gone (of course there will be healing items and healing classes that are a must if you want to beat a boss).
The beginning bosses may not be as hard or consequential as the later bosses, but I imagine a similar system for them breaking stagger.

Sorry, I think I've just rambled...

I also find it might be necessary to mention that the staggering system for multiple players attacking one enemy isn't fully replacing one stagger time with the next.

If you're attacked with .24 second stagger and then a .74, the .74 replaces the .24.

If you're attacked with a .74 second stagger and then a .24, 30% of the .24 stagger will be added to the currently remaining time of the .74.

So higher stagger replaces lower stagger and lower stagger adds a little on to higher stagger.

But if there were 16 players all pommeling a boss, 35 hits would go off rather quickly and then the boss would end up recovering or breaking, so it's not like the boss is just permanently combo'd.
If you're alone fighting a boss (some dungeons/quests may end up this way, being 'solo' quests), your decay will eventually mean you're hitting every .30 seconds and staggering for .27 or less.

And, if a boss is in the middle of an attack or casting a spell, it'll take a certain amount of hits/stagger just to break that spell or otherwise action and force the boss into staggering.
It's supposed to be adaptive on how long it takes for a spell 'interrupt' or action canceling through stagger, as in 1 player will only need to attack 1-6 times to break a boss out of staggering and a party of 16 would take many hits.

Some minor dungeon 'units' that aren't as powerful as bosses might just take like, 25/50% of regular stagger if there are a lot of players in the party, and after so many hits they just get thrown away, roll, and get back up in less than a second (lying down on the floor for 2 seconds is just irritating, unnecessary waiting).

Sorry for bombarding you with a huge reply like this, but thanks so much for the replies and ... faithful reading of my walls of text (am I beginning to look like Aersix?)