I just watched a skyrim video and noticed that the player was blocking with a one handed weapon, and nothing else in the other hand. don't know if this has done been said or not... but if not there you go you can block with 1h weapons as long as there is nothing in the other hand.

I also saw this.

you do know people have been wondering if you can do that ever since dual wielding was announced, right?

And yet you can't do this if you have two weapons equipped... You'd think having twice as many weapons would double your blocking potential but...

Way to kill sense...

:shrug: The only thing I can think of is it would be overpowering to dual-wield and block. I know it makes sense but... :shrug:

Actually you'll notice you block by holding the weapon with the other hand too, so within the game system it does not "kill sense"

It's not a question of sense, it's a question of balance and design; making sure each particular weapon choice works inside it's own niche and doesn't mitigate the benefits of another weapon style.

I was so ecstatic I took a screenshot. It was @ 2:02 of the second viddy and the character was holding out their 1HandMelee weapon just like in Oblivion and the Fallouts. Fantastic news! Now all we need is a way to block with an 'X' formation while dual wielding (Press+Hold both triggers/mouse buttons+move backward?) and/or the ability to block the same way with a one hander we're not currently attacking with. Also, staves!
Balance be damned!:P Such maneuvers wouldn't be specific to the player character. Many foes will also be dual wielding and, just like multiple summons, it actually makes the game harder when enemies are more adept. When you see dual wielding NPCs, wouldn't you rather not habitually regard them as a completely *defenseless sitting ducks? :shrug: I'm still really hoping the feedback influences them or already has and that they're doing something about dual wield blocking, to flesh out one of the game's potentially coolest new features.

*exactly what the player will be if there's no dual wield blocking mechanism

If you're a game designer and you have to choose between balance and common sense in your game, then you know you've done a crappy job.

What an absurd statement, plenty of games make concession's in realism for the sake of gameplay. In fact, almost all games do.

Furthermore, JustinOther, the idea that the player is defenceless while dual-wielding is kind of a misrepresentation. You can move, can you not? Dodging and out-stepping your opponent are probably going to factor quite strongly into the dual-wield playstyle. You're only a sitting duck if you're sitting still.

Dual-wielding allows for increased offensive opportunities, it's a very simple and clear design and balance decision to give it reduced defensive capabiltiies to compensate.

Ideally, you would be able to parry or dual-wield with two swords, but with a lessened effectiveness, but then you change wielding a single weapon into a functionally identical experience to dual-wielding, but simply mathematically different, which is a flawed design decision to make in an Action/RPG.

Haha yes, in fact dual-wielding itself is a very example, it may not be realistic but it's "cool".

It really does feel like it'll be simple to program a mod that allows you to block while dual-wielding, even if it has to make the off-hand weapon disappear once you press a specific button, and reappear once you let go.

I'm just glad the styles play differently, Oblivions got boring very quickly.

The thing is with dual wielding it needs some big drawback because it's potential power is massive. Lets say you have this set up:

Axe, enchanted with fire, poisoned with a silence poison and player has axe perks.
Mace, enchanted with frost, poisoned with drain stamina poison and player has mace perks.

So you run up to someone and do a dual power attack. Not only did you do massive damage from the combined attack but the mace ignored a large chunk of armour, caused frost damage, slowed them and drained their stamina. The axe has left them bleeding, caused fire damage, health drain from the fire and silenced them.

So in just that single attack the enemy is slowed, on fire, bleeding, having stamina drained and is silenced, on top of taking massive damage in the first place. That is likely going to kill most standard enemies, if not from the attack but the health damage over time, while they are also slowed making it easier to dodge their attacks.

I knew this months ago. It was shown on a screenshot and was very obvious.

Common sense flew out the window when they included dual-wielding weapons. Seriously, nobody ever fought like this. At most you'd have a dagger in your off-hand for duels. Technically they shouldn't allow any blocking at all except with a shield and implement a parry system, but those are hard to design and can become frustratingly complex to control. Mount and Blade sort of pulls it off but it's far from perfect. It also doesn't have animals and monsters attacking you, and trying to parry a bear taking a swipe at you would really just end badly.

In short, nothing in Skyrim accurately resembles real-life melee combat, a trait it has in common with pretty much every action RPG ever. So can we please drop this line of ridiculous reasoning?

What I'm concerned with is blocking when wielding a 1H-weapon and spell.
Does anyone know if we will be able to do that?

sadly it will NOT be possible
i also wanted to fight melee with a sprinkle of magic but seeing as i cant block - i think i will give this idea up.
i hope for a mod to remedy this and use the weapon+empty hand blocking animation.

however, if u look at the 2nd playthrough clip in HD (in the dungeon fighting the undead draugrs), at 2:36, u can see that when u use magic+weapon u can use the handle of the sword to bash (pulling both triggers). if , by doing this, u can cancel the NPC's attack animation and cause him to stagger instead, than it can be used as an alternative to parrying (like in "dead island" u can kick in order to allow room for an attack).
if bashing can be used as a defensive move than im all for it and THIS might be the thing that will bring my will to use magic+weapon back. sadly im pessimistic as to whether bashing cancels attack. on trolls or large animals i accept that it doesnt, but it makes perfect sense to cause any human sized opponent to stagger (as a gameplay mechanic)... but sense flew out the window and fell 7 stories down a while ago and if bethesda thinks it's unbalanced to stagger a bandit with the hilt than who are we to argue...

It seems likely you will be able "block" with a more active alteration shield in your off-hand ... but it's mostly speculation right now.

:cookie:

Yeah i guess you can block with 1ed weapon if you have a shield in another hand.
Blocking with spell and sword would be imbalanced and thats why we cant do this IMO.

As others have said it's not possible. Some of the destruction perks add stagger chance to spells though, so while it won't work every time you can pepper an enemy with quick blast to try and keep them off balance, then attack with your weapon. The shield spell now works more like a real shield too.

Well that svcks. I wanted to play a spellsword type character now that it actually seemed like it would work well. But if I cant block that might create a problem..I will probably try it anyways.

The best thing to do is create a favorite to take the spell off your left hand so you can block.

How will it create a problem? Do some of you not think enough about what you have at your disposel or what. It encourages thought and tactics,plus you can switch styles in a heart beat,what more do people want.....Oh...i see.....God gaming.....no thanks.

It creates a problem because now playing a spellsword (magic in 1h sword in the other) lacks one of the most basic defensive abilities. Why I can block with a single 1h weapon but not a 1h weapon and a spell just seems silly to me. Yes I can switch on the fly, but why cant I just block with the 1h weapon without unequiping the spell. They essential have the same effect, just now I am required to constantly switch my off-hand spell just so I can block.
How this remotely makes that type of character god-mode is beyond me.
The dragon shouts are much closer to god-mode than simply blocking an attack.

yeah, i think the same as u. it's like the mighty dovahkiin can't put off the fire on the his hand to hold the sword and block...
but he can if u switch to empty hand....

wierd...

anyways, i guess that u and i should attack with spells from long range and once we get close we need to change to empty hand or shield, do some melee and if we get farther away than switch to magic one more. cumbersome but it might work.
also remember than u can Bash. use magic and sword to attack and once the enemy is attacking u - bash it to stagger.

if staggering doesnt work 100% of the time than this tactic is boiled down to luck, and i hate luck with my games. if i react on time - reward me with the outcome i was going for.

i dunno. we'll see how this play out.