I thought that discussion about hand to hand combat, needs it's own topic, i think that hand to hand in the Elder Scrolls is really Undeveloped, and doesn't attract players, what i think should be added is, sub-branches, attack and defense, personally i train Aikido, some moves like in Aikido could make hand to hand attractive, so if you have low skill you will probably fail at first, another thing is i think if they make this they would need to change the combat system a little bit.

So what do you think?
Discuss...

It is very bare bones and very uninteresting they should have put more thought in to it for our would be monks and so on and so forth.

I think Hand-to-hand had a lot of potential, but nothing was really done with it. I would have liked to see special gloves or fist weapons, and possibly some cast-on-strike with hand-to-hand. I think there was a mod (don't know if it was for Morrowind or Oblivion) that added magical effects to your punches, but I recall it being very buggy.

Problem is that the majority of players really dont care for hand to hand, simply because a spell, archer, blade or blunt can do about 5 times better, plus the animations are hand to hand specific, meaning a lot of work is wasted on it (comparing it to the ratio of users not using hand to hand)



I recall that there was something like this in oblivion Midas Magic.

That is true, but if hand-to-hand were made better, players might feel more inclined to use it. Granted, it still probably wouldn't be as popular as swords or magic, but if it was still a viable skill to rely on with benefits that other weapon types don't have, some players might still choose it.

I recall that in some places, several martial arts styles are suggested, maybe instead of having just basic punches and kicks, these combat styles could be reflected in the game, allowing for more variety in hand to hand attacks. Also, it might be good to have some non-lethal options with hand to hand, so if you don't want to kill an NPC, you could instead knock that person out or something. It could also be used in quests. This isn't to say hand to hand shouldn't be able to kill your enemies, just that you could have the option not to.

And yes, the ability to add magical effects to your hand to hand attacks would be nice (I'm thinking either some kind of spell that adds on strike spells of a specific type for your hand to hand attacks, alternately, it could be possible to enchant gloves and gauntlets with a "Cast on strike" enchantment which would add their effects to hand to hand.) seeing as the inability to add any enchantments to your attacks is one of the disadvantages that hand to hand combat suffers in comparison to weapon skills.

B-but, *resists urge to quote one's own signature* there are plenty of benefits that would be added to hand-to-hand if they did it right. Say they added disarms, counters, and stealth moves to the system. Suddenly, a whole new window of combat is opened.

Improvements for Hand to Hand combat

Hand Weapons: brass knuckles, katars, claws, punching daggers, and so on. These would add a damage boost as well as allow an H2H character to deal enchantment damages to creatures on strike.

H2H health damage and speed depends on hand gear (gauntlet weight, gauntlet armor type, and clothing). The heavier the armor, the slower the attacks, but the more damage inflicted. The lighter the armor/clothing, the faster the attacks, but there is less damage. This is a nice anolog to the one-handed and two-handed weapon trade-offs of speed vs. damage output per strike.

H2H also inflicts fatigue damage to the opponent.

H2H damage (health and fatigue) also determined by enemy's armor (simple gloves will have trouble causing damage to a foe encased in ebony armor).

H2H (along with the rest of combat) needs locational damage. Hitting the hands may increase the chance of disarming an opponent; striking an unprotected windpipe will briefly incapacitate an enemy.

H2H should also include kicking. By extension, damage done by kicking would depend on foot gear weight. Stomping on an opponents foot or kicking shins would slow an opponent.

H2H gauntlets should be able to have on-strike enchantments.

I prefer hand to hand free of props, myself.

Eh...before hand to hand is improved id like them to bring back spear and throwing knifes. i think that would be a far more valuable addition to the game. after all, TES isnt street fighter, its TES.

im going to smash a boss with my fist instead of using magic or a sword RAWR !!!!!!!!!!! i guess it wasn't really made to be that serious

Instead of different subbranches I think it should just be one skill so that things don't get too complicated. One Idea is to make the hand to hand skill fairly weak at first, but as your skill grows you gain perks that let you chain power attack combos instead of just doing one power attack, so it becomes one of the most powerful skills, based on the skill level of the character and the player's skill. Also, I think I'm not alone in thinking that there should be better animations for the attacks. I would rather it look like you were a martial artist (for the more advanced moves) then some drunk in a bar who decided to get in a fist fight with his enemy.

an idea I'v had about combat in general: fighting styles. within hand to hand, there would be three or four fighting styles that ould increase with use of them (you could have a 25 in hand to hand but a 100 in Judo if everything else was at 0.) This way, a fighting style could have unique controls, and in order to use the movs of a different style you would have to go through a menu.

Hand-to-hand has never been a viable option in any TES game. Which makes sense considering most things you are punching are armored in some sort of metal. They need to add fist weapons and counters for it to draw people in to actually wanting to play a h2h character.

Off-topic, but I agree with 3rd about bringing back throwing/spear. Add back crossbow/blunt/axe/long sword/short sword/etc skills as well. They really messed up in clumping a lot of those together or flat out removing them. I think they could re-add those, as well as fist weapons at the same time without too much effort.

Heh heh. Indeed!

I believe that for the most part Bethesda is fine leaving hand-to-hand in the light of the traditional sense that it's only meant for when you're caught unarmed or you are disarmed. It's not meant to replace swordsmanship.

That said, it is also a very un-roleplaying attitude to take with it. So in a way I'd love to see myself overruled there. Especially the bestial races could have significantly more interesting hand-to-hand advantages than just a simple racial skill bonus. I'm thinking though that the advantage to hand-to-hand should be more in the lines of noiseless melee attacks so that nearby foes aren't made aware of your pummeling a guard by the clashing of steel on steel. Something along those kinds of lines. Or even possibly in disabling people for an extended period of time without necessarily killing them. Something that goes beyond the simple fatigue damage should you knock your opponent unconscious in hand-to-hand. I think something along these lines would be fitting of TES.

Sneak attack in hand to hand should be (depending on the fighting style) a chokehold, which could have a very long lasting paralize affect. sneak attacks need to mbe much more deadly, like slitting troats and braking people's spines.

Equipable? I would enjoy it.

In real hand to hand combat, especially against armed and armored opponents, you would realistically have more disarming moves or moves to attack joints of other weak spots in the armor. Also, in a hand to hand fight, it's not just punches and kicks. There are holds, throws, submissions, headbutts, etc.

That would go fairly well with Don't Forget This. Training in Submission, Disarming, Attacking, and KO. If animations were improved in TES V these could be variants of of 2 basic combat controls. Submission and Disarming could work off of block and Attacking/KO off of the current "flail" button (:brokencomputer: curse you OB animations)
Disarming could rip off shields, weapons, and (against H@H) throw. -Timing the move to a block or attack with less sucess further from the que. Most attempts would be a block. EDIT: speed oriented, and the most unique attack to H2H
Submission would work to immobilize, possibly similar to fallout location damage. - Endurance oriented
Attacking is general health damage, maybe poison-able. -Strength oriented
KO for general fatigue/crippling moves. -Agility oriented
While H2H would still generally be speed oriented.

While defensive moves could be executed regardless of armorment, attacking a heavily armored opponent would require some equipment or magic enhancement.

I loved the DB, black hand, hand to hand master, Khajit in Oblivion. He was awsome, from what little i saw. Definatley made me consider H2H characters after that, but there just werent enough or any at all, equipment orientated cloths or knuckle dusters etc to make it appeal/more viable choice. If they did address this, i would want to try it.

Alright here is how you make H2H stand out. NPC awareness, stealth kills, and two handed channeling. Say your walking around with your big 2H Battle Axe out, make people notice you and watch you. NPC's only pull there weapons out when there's danger and if they see you with yours out they will be ready for action making it imposible to sneek attack or stealth kill them until you are out of sight and off there mind. Now say you walk behind someone before u pull your weapon out, they will hear the unsheathing of the weapon and turn to see what the sound was.

Now with H2H none of this is relevant because your hands are always at the ready. Moving your hands from your side to fighting position is silent, walking around with your fists up is a bit less noticeable. Its much easier to walk behind someone and punch them in the back of the head then it is to pull a sword out without being heard.

Now think about this. make spells cast slower if your holding a two handed weapon (exception being magic staff or the sort) because its hard to form a fireball in your hand without incinerating your weapon. One handed weapons (without a shield) cast standard speed because you have the free hand to channel. Now here is where two handed comes in, well, handy. no gaunts or gloves on being able to cast with two hands for a higher mana cost but also a higher damage output. you can focus bigger fireballs with bigger AOE damage then you could with objects in your hand. You can launch more powerful lightning bolts and what not.

I wanted to add more to it but for now ill throw this up and let you guys discuss.

*squees self* anyway, on to the topic.

This is one of those things, like telekinesis, that has so much potential but is ignored by the devs. So Yes, it needs major improvements, kicks, throws, headbutts. I think the best idea for feasable lethality would be a variety of krav maga, but other styles should be available.

speed and strength should play major roles in the skill, boots, gauntlets and other stuff.

with locational damge, could be great.

also, if it gets that many improvements, for balance, remove blocking (hear me out) and replace it with counters, by tapping the block button when the enemy attacks, goes right, varying effects, goes wrong, face full of sword.

and non lethal attacks would be nice too, I guess.

Maybe they could expand by adding different fighting styles that you could learn as you progressed in the skill. Each style could be different in terms of damage per hit, speed of hit, delay after attack. You could have a very fast paced fighting style that keeps your opponent from making a lot of blows, but it wont hit nearly as hard as a slower, more powerful style. Also, incorporate kicks into the fighting.

EDIT: Also, I would definitely play as a hand-to-hand character if these were applied.

Been constantly trying to make H2H characters...only my MW character has use for it, and it's pretty much to 'play' with enemies.

In the description for Khajiit it states that most Khajiit prefer to use their claws in combat than a weapon, so there's no reason to not include this

As for high flying acrobatic martial arts crazyness... I'd rather not have it. Some useful combat such as judo or boxing (or call it even and just look at modern MMA) would be nice, effective blows and grapples over 720 spin kicks

H2H lacks a bit of oomph (however you won't find a better Strength-trainer in Oblivion).

I wouldn't mind them making some more fluid animations and H2H-special attacks in TES5, but...if I have a sword(and marginal skill) and you have nothing, you will be at a significant disadvantage. We invented weapons for a reason - because humans make lousy natural fighters.
I don't want want StreetfighterVIII, I want TES V. With swords(and preferrably spears).

But adding H2H-weapons would be a neat touch. As would adding fighting styles - the burly barbarian relying on strength and ferocity, the agile agent using his long dagger and cloak, or the swift khajiit using his rain of sand.