I'm not sure TES's combat has ever been as good as it could have been. And having read a ton anolysis and journals about game design, especially in having to do with combat systems, I'd like to share what I've learned.

First off, violence and spectacle are not what make a combat system fun. A psychological test using Half-Life 2 replaced the gun noises, guns, and blood splatter with all non-violent looking assets. People had nearly as much fun playing the game as when all the normal violence was present. Spectacle such as the “kill moves” is just that, spectacle. Fun to watch but not to play.

What I'd love to see is a wide variation of how each type of weapon handles. Shields should block, weapons should parry. Parrying can result in a melee weapon being blocked, or if more skilled thrown to the side and momentarily presenting an opening. Blocking with a shield might make it hard to throw a weapon out, but logically should also be able to block arrows and magic.

“Staggering” an enemy is a good game mechanic, but again should be about what weapon you're using. A heavy mace or hammer is going to be a lot better at this than a short sword. Blocking a mace is also going to be less effective since it's going to have a lot more force behind it. Alternatively swinging a sword or something lighter and better balanced is just going to be plain faster than a heavy mace.

While a “shield rush” might make sense with a shield, a more “Duke/Spartaaa!” style bootkick might be a better alternate attack when not using a shield (governed by hand to hand, if it exists). A shield bash might shove an enemy over, a solid kick might trip him.

I'd also love to see the length of a melee weapon matter more. A spear (if they exist) should be good at keeping enemies back, perhaps by “staggering” an enemy a tiny bit when getting hit. You don't just ignore being stabbed by a spear after all. I'd love to see a “press and hold” like power attack, trading time and vulnerability for a more powerful attack. And of course I'll plead the need for a dodge until I'm blue in the face. More game mechanics = better game.

Overall message, interesting gameplay mechanics and a good “back and forth” battle first, “visceral” very much a second. We've gotten “the combat needs to be more visceral” before both Morrowind and Oblivion, neither of which worked out fantastically. Make sure the combat is fun by itself, without cool finishing moves, lots of blood and etc. Only after it's fundamentally fun should you add cool spectacle on top of it.

Agreed.

Couldn't care less about finishing moves, really. It's a pretty animation I'll get over after I see it the first ten times. Combat should be the sort of thing where it always feels like there's the potential for something slightly new to happen, depending on the tactics used, the weapons used, the enemy, and so on. That's what keeps it interesting.

I agree with the OP.

This goes for NPCs also, many of them would be seasoned warriors. I want to say to myself "I'd better watch myself here, I could get my butt seriously kicked " Instead of 'Block, Stab, Block, Stab'. I can imagine the panic whilst trying to scramble to my feet after just being knocked flat on my backside by a burly Redguard.

However, I feel the new "Killing Blow" animations are a must for assassination kills. This is obvious, as there is little combat involved.

I also agree, although I do like the spectacle as well. The spectacle, or pay off, of the finishing move will be much better if the combat that preceded it was both fun and challenging.

Only up to a certain point. That point will likely vary from player to player. Beyond it you are potentially just over-complicating things.

I would instantly trade finishing moves for more depth in combat though.

Being able to interchange hand-to-hand attacks with weapons, and utilize real parries (Where you block and Strike in the same motion) would be very fun.

I agree with everything you said. I've never agreed more with a person in my life. I especially like how you take a jab at all this "visceral" combat nonsense.

:thumbsup:

I think combat should involve strikes that usually get blocked and don't do damage, but once the opponent fails to block, it'll do a vast amount of damage. I'm not opposed to lengthy battles, but I'm very bothered by the ittie bittie damage each successful strike produces. A good example is from a horror game (forgot what the name is) where you play a cop investigating a building full of crazy people, who will attack you with melee weapons and you only have a few rounds in the gun. You will have to fight them by carefully blocking their strikes.

Condemned? That game had awesome melee combat.

yea that's it... even though I never picked up the melee fight so I gave up lol. It was a little difficult. but I should try it out again

I agree with that, though you do need to be careful. Too much blocking could be boring for some and if the 'vast amount of damage' is also applied to the player there is the potential people could die frequently, leading to frustration (personally I'm happy with, 'don't die - just get knocked unconscious').

The problem with "you should have to block a lot" is it's just a lot of doing the same thing, pressing the same button every two seconds most of the time doesn't sound very fun does it? It's the same reason bullets usually don't work in games like in real life, one time instant failures is just far to punishing for a game, even really hard games like Max Payne or Demon Soul's. It's almost always better to let the player have some leeway, especially in situations that occur over and over again.

I think you guys are crazy if you don't think finishing animations are necessary. I don't want to be in a sword fight and just have the guy fall over when his health is depleted. I want to see him actually die. Be it just a gash in his chest/stomach, a rare decapitation, a deep stab, etc. will add a lot to every battle.

It depends on how the finishing moves are done. They're all to often Hollywood-esque cheese and I'm just not interested in that (see Dragon Age ogre battle).

I actually had no problem with the finishing moves themselves in Dragon Age. The only problem was when they'd happen in the middle of combat and prevent you from moving on to the next enemy or leave you vulnerable for a few seconds. In Skyrim, finishing moves should happen only on the last enemy in combat to prevent stuff like that from happening.

The chances of these finishing moves being "Hollywood-esque", cheesy kills is 0% considering how Bethesda is trying to create a realistic, immersive and believable world. And specially when the game is played 99% of the time in 1st person, imagine all those crazy flips and vertical attacks, people with motion sickness would threw up on the screen / TV.

To be honest I've never played Dragon Age, I saw the ogre battle video pre-release and completely put me off. Maybe it wasn't reflective of the rest of the game but it's a good example of what I dislike. I certainly don't want any cut scene style finishing moves, with camera angle changes of slow-motion etc.

I think that the finishers aren't necessary but they can add a much needed bit of zazz to a fight. It isn't like it will be some huge thing that takes 5-6 seconds like a MK fatality. imo it will be something like a deep stab with a sword and then you push them off your blade, something that takes 1-2 seconds tops.

Eh, the slow mo ones only happened at the end of boss fights for the most part, so they weren't all that intrusive.

Mount and blade

Perfect medieval combat

there should be more than one way to swing a weapon.

by that i mean that i should be able to swing a sword left if there is an opening, or at his head if its unprotected.

none of this spam/block/longer spam/block stuff.

Normal and power attacks! Already done and work well in other games, never be to ashamed to steal outright.

Everything I know about medieval combat (it has pictures, lol)

http://www.thortrains.com/getright/Medieval%20Combat.htm

Couple of interesting quotes:






A worthwhile reference I believe showing the actual techniques used by men who were genuinely trying to kill each other and not just a bunch of screen writers out to give the masses a thrill.


The down side, I guess, comes from looking at all the various moves and realising it is impossible for a current game to come even close when limited by a keyboard/mouse/controller.

I agree with the OP. It would be nice if weapons had an innate modifier to avoidance based upon how you went about it. Arrows shouldn't be able to be parried (Though allowing you to do so with a perk and extremely good timing would be interesting), but maces, slashing weapons and axes would be. Thrusting weapons would be more difficult to parry, but would be somewhat easier to block, and arrows and projectile spells should be blockable as well.

Then give parry a disarm chance, and shields a shield bash ability (Which is already in apparently) and it would be just about perfect.