Well, it was slightly improved. Not a really good argument for erasing a bunch of weapons methinks. Instead of pumping all the money into graphics they could focus on something else.

BTW: > XD
Painted smileys rulz !

:confused: And what do you call the weapon animations that are used in Morrowind? Fake animations?


If you mean that they spent time to program in complex Combat AI packages, then you are correct. And I will give that as a HUGE point in Oblivion's favor. Even if they didn't implement that AI system in a way I'd prefer, the fact remains that the potential for such a dynamic combat system is massive.

The only real problem is that they took out character- and NPC-relevant dicerolls using skills and attributes to factor into those Combat AI packages. And before anyone gets up on a high horse about how diceroll randomization is an old and decrepit system and that Oblivion is all the better without it, then you'd better realize that Oblivion already has dicerolls: they're used in those Combat AI packages to randomly determine what the NPC will do within the limitations set by the AI variables. It's just that they don't factor in any skills or player/NPC stat information at all.

So at the core of the game mechanics (eschewing visual representation), Morrowind has a far more solid diceroll system regarding how it is affected by the player's and opponent's skills and attributes. Oblivion lacks this. When that NPC in the arena snaps up his shield to block you, the actual decision and/or ability to block has nothing to do with the block skill. When he decides to dodge or attempt to run around you in circles, the decision has nothing to do with the agility or speed attributes. That's Oblivion's combat problem, for me. Combat skills only affect how much damage you do when you swing, and nothing else (aside from perks, of course, but that's a whole other issue to take up).

Also, having content missing that would've been a sensible addition to the game is something you shouldn't be brushing off. It's why many people say Morrowind is a better game because there was more to it

slightly improved? Morrowind's combat was boring and lame.... besides that the animations looked awefull it is also stupid that when you hit someone they appartly "envaded"it.... With the skills perks, comtrolled blocking, a smaller angle in wich you can hit the enemy, no misses and alot better animations the combat made major improvements..... It costs some weapons like crossbows, throwing weapons and spears..... so what? And BTW weapon variety is quantity... not quality XD

ow.... I just simply prefer XD.... that this forum doesn't have that painted smiley makes me just very sad

You end up with a weapons system that lacks any depth and almost all variety or thought past do I want range or melee? because weapons just automatically improve as you move from glass to steel etc and there was never any point picking a smaller weapon over a longsword or claymore because they were just inferior. They couldn't have made things any more linear.

Well there certainly is no quantity... what with all blades, blunt weapons and blunt axes behaving the exact same way...
Oblivion effectively reduced the variety of available weapons to... 2: bows and the rest.

to put it simply.... No.....

Haha, couldn't say it better !

oh, come on now. The dagger had the same animations as a one hander axe. The truth is, animations havn't been improved upon since Redguard.

Ehm.. In morrowind they also have the same animations.......

Ehm.. I'm not actually talking about the animations. In fact that's the last thing that concerns me...
Spears did have a longer range for instance, crossbows had standard damage, stars where extremely fast etc.

Tell me then, how much more thought did you put into your weapons choices? Prove me wrong. If you were going to make your character fight at their best you just picked the weapon from their skillset that did the most damage per strike or, if you were melee you might choose to have a shield instead of the claymore or whatever because blunt and blade were pretty much the same. Whereas in morrowind (I shall use ranged for this exampel you had the fast firing darts knive etc that, when you had a high skill allowed you to semi stun your opponent, or you could go the high damage option with a cross bow. Both of which were taken out in the sequel. Now I'm not going to sit here and claim that morrowind's weapons system is the most complex and interesting thing on earth but it was more complex and less linear than Oblivion's.

But Morrowind had the three different styles of attack. Chop, Slash, Thrust. If you chopped or slashed with a spear, you weren't going to get anywhere, but if you thrust with that spear, you'd be in business. And if you thrust with an axe, you'd be out of luck, but if you chopped or slashed, you'd be scoring hits. Each weapon had its own fairly unique style of use. They behaved in different ways, and you had to largely use them in different ways.

And yes, the usage of that system was optional, as the player could toggle "always use best attack" instead. But Oblivion players should know all about defending optional gameplay mechanics.

You were the previous post.... I can't keep track of everyone who's attacking me XD


There's still difference in range.....



The heavier the weapon the more fatigue it costs to swing them and the longer the swing takes..... A stealth user who has not much streng can't handly as good with a claymore as he can with a shortsword or dagger.... It's true that the dagger was a bit underpowered in OB..... bbut daggers are really fast and for mages (and assasins) who use poisons it's extremely handy (something that is missing in Morrowind, poisons (well they excist... but aren't really handy)


And that's it..... Oblivion had 8 different power attacks.... 4 with skill perks and 4 without.... One for each direction... one moveing forward, one sideward, one backward and one standing still... Each has a different effect..... 1 can disarm the opponent,they confuse the opponent for a moment or even knock an opponent down..... Also 2-handed weapons also had differrent power attack animations.... And all the power attack animations are really different from one another......

There's a world of difference between a damage-separating system that affects all aspects of usage in combat and a system of superfluous perks that provided extra-damage attacks and usage benefits. You can play through the entirety of Oblivion without once using power-attacks. You cannot play through the entirety of Morrowind without once having to deal with weapon damage-separation; even if you're using "always use best attack," you're still working within that system.

If the original argument was how gameplay mechanics made weapons more varied or unique, then a system that affects me 100% of the time wins out over a system that affects me when I choose it to.

No you're not..... you're just using the same animations.... The fact that the manner how you attack depended on how you move is stange..... I don't know the exact direction but why would you only be able to chop when you move sidewards?? that's just strange...... While in Oblivion it's more logical to have a powerattack aimed at a certain direction.... When you step sidewards it's easier to make a twist and hit the enemy and when your moving forward you (I don't know how to say this in correct english XD) you are more able to make a further reach towards the enemy... as does stepping backwards make it logical to make a low-handed swing......

Not so marked, try using a spear in Morrowind it's really different from a sword


As poisons still work just as well on larger weapons, being one shot and all it that point is redundant.
Daggers are much faster so you can move close, strike and move away without being hit and if you want to stay close you can kepp hitting and between every hit use a new poison wich isn't able with a longsword, claymore or blunt weapon...
Also every character has ample strength to swing the larger weapons and will, over time gain a high block skill, except for maybe mages.
No they don't mages and stealth users would still be bad with larger weapons.....
Another problem with this is that fatigue makes very little difference in the game and 99% of the time you're best off with the weapon that does the most damage
When you keep hitting with the claymore a non-warrior loses fatigue very quick and at low fatigue you deal alot less damage and might even knock down - I have never ever, not once fallen over from lack of fatigue in oblivion, neither does the damage reduction really affect your performance much. I can also speak from experience when i say that assassin characters don't run out of fatigue from using larger weapons. And the poisons, I'll be hionest and say ui don't see your point, you can poison all weapons in the game so why is a dagger better when other weapons do more natural damage per strike also. I can see your point for enchantments but not poisons




Most of which were unreliable and you only every really used on or two of those, it still doesn't require you to think much about the combat, you simply repeat the sequence - block, wait for strike then retaliate ad infinitum
No..... Power attacks are really handy, if you didn't used them it's your bad..... And in morrowind you just keep clicking since there's nothing else to do... no blocking makes you just keep striking as your opponent.. - ah but to get the most out of your attacks you need to manoeuveur and save you fatigue (it actually matters in Morrowind)

It was a bit hard to find you're reactions XD

anyway...

The falling down is true (just came in that it was a mod)
You can use poisons the same way as enchantments... I alreafy stated then a few reactions earlier..... You can keep hitting and between every hit you just add a new poison.. (just go to the inventory during the slashing) so with the dagger you get alot more hits and so you can use the poisons much faster then with a heavier weapon......



It also matters in Oblivion.....

Perhaps a refresher of Rohugh's opening post is in order:


Some of you need to keep the tone of defensiveness out of your posts, regardless of which game you favor. One person's stating their numerous likes for Morrowind, or dislikes of Oblivion is NOT a personal challenge to others. You can disagree and discuss things without getting rude or making sarcastic asides. For example, if someone says they like this that or the other thing in Morrowind and felt Oblivion lacked it (or vice versa) a response of "Yeah Right!" accompanied by a facepalm smiley, is unacceptable.

There are speed, damage, and range in Oblivion's combat system, as well. This time, though, as you can actually hit your opponent, they are relevant to how you play the game.

I actually make use of the weapon's different capabilities. It's largely roleplay, but does have an effect on the game. Some weapons are suited to taking on a particular type of enemy; you wouldn't charge at someone with a shield if you had a battleaxe, and you wouldn't use a claymore if you were trying to defeat an archer.



Don't change the subject, we were talking about the animations and combat. Those perks also provided speed benefits, and could disarm and paralyse your opponent, as well as other things. There was nothing like that in Morrowind, where the combat was basic. It was so simple compared to Oblivion that it's unrealistic; almost as much as the ridiculous animations.



So, is fast travel a good idea? Or was Morrowind's combat bad compared to Oblivion's in every single way? If you agree with the statement you made, you can't have both.



But is that the one that is slow, or the one that is fast? Is it the one that can be blocked, or the one that will be too quick? Is it the one that makes my character tired and less powerful, or the one that doesn't do that as much?



In Morrowind, you couldn't even choose when to block. And if you're going to criticise the game because you don't want to look for the advantage in combat, then the point is redundant - what you do in your game does not affect mine.



That's actually what I'd call them. They looked fake, and the game proved they were when I failed to hit.



I went through the list, and every single point he made.

alright, responding to the parts of your post that were aimed at my past comments

As I've said to Egypt raider before, fatigue, weapon speed etc is almost totally redundant in Oblivion. As to your comment, I was referring solely to melee at the time and so always, without exception you will be best off with the weapon that does the most damage, unless of course you want a shield. Fatigue barely matters in the vanilla game so that's a non-issue and since the most efficient form of combat is block then strike, weapon speed makes little to no difference either. It isn't like Morrowind where faster weapons really gave you a more reliable amount of damage because of the increased attack speed, nor do any of the melee weapons have any noticable range difference so you can't keep your opponants out of range whilst still attacking.

Actually, the post I was responding to had quoted a previous poster who talked about "all blades, blunt weapons and blunt axes behaving the exact same way." I was reinforcing that Oblivion critique by bringing up Morrowind combat mechanics.



Umm... How does hypothetically backing an optional "always use best attack" toggle equate to "Morrowind's combat [was] bad compared to Oblivion's in every single way?" That's fairly sensationalist, isn't it? If anything, your statement should say, "Is fast travel a good idea? Or was Morrowind's "always use best attack" a bad idea?" If I had to choose, I'd say that "always use best attack" is a bad idea, as optionality where one side undercuts or waters down feasibility of the other side is a bad thing, in my book. However, the argument could be made that Oblivion's system of Fast Travel is a core game mechanic that significantly altered the design philosophy of Oblivion as a whole, whereas Morrowind's "always use best attack" was a small add-in buried in the preferences that barely affects overall design philosophy at all. I know you disagree heartily with that argument, though.



:shrug: For the actual look of the animations, that's a sign of the times, really. Morrowind's a 2002 game. It has 2002 animations. And it doesn't really help matters that Bethesda's animations are a bit notorious for being substandard to other things out there. I can't really think of technical improvements in terms of graphics as a plus or minus to any game, honestly. I won't critique TES:IV's animations as inferior to TES:V's animations when it comes out, because TES:IV is a 2006 game, whereas TES:V will be a 2010+ game. Tech improves, poly counts improve, animation software improves.

For the nonexistent failure to hit animations, that's where I will wholeheartedly agree with you. Morrowind's failure to give you any real visual sense of "I missed" or "they dodged/parried," any real tangible explanation for why you heard that swishing sound, was abhorrent. It's one of the reasons I am glad for the work Bethesda did on developing the groundwork for a dynamic AI-based combat system, which I give high praise.

The problem is, Oblivion removed the player and/or NPC skill/attribute influence in the dicerolls within the combat AI packages. So while Oblivion has the undisputed upper hand on what the player actually sees on the screen, Morrowind has the upper hand on what's happening behind the scenes. Combine those two systems (with tweaking, of course), and you get pure, undiluted awesome.