The other spear thread hit post limit.

Okay, so there has been an uproar ever since everyone found out that there will be no spears in Skyrim. However, it has just become a doomsaying situation. People need to realize that just because spears aren't in the game doesn't mean they won't have a polearm of some sort. In fact, in lieu of spears, Todd made it pretty obvious that spears won't be in the game but the way he talked there will be other polearms, which is also supported by concept art of halberds and bardiches.

Now, this whole thread is to allow people to realize that just because there are no spears in Skyrim doesn't mean that you won't get the same aesthetic effect that some people have for spears, the other polearms they are adding to the game has the same basic build as a spear but actually have more flashiness to the look than a spear such as different blades attached to the end of the pole. Also, the other polearms allow for a more balanced gameplay than spears. Spears in their previous incarnation didn't allow for retaliation due to the fact it was a stabbing motion that came in between the target and the player. With polearms, they can be more claymores with a longer reach. With their wide swings, they allow for gaps in between attacks to retaliate unlike what spears did in Morrowind. It would just be easier to put polearms in the game, which are more aesthetically pleasing and allow for balanced gameplay mechanics established by claymores.

So in short, those that are unhappy with the lack of spears in Skyrim really shouldn't be disappointed since technically a spear-like weapon is coming into the game (unless development goes in a different direction of course) so you can still carry your long pole with you that you can kill people with, it just won't be stabbing people to death without repercussions.

For those that don't believe that spears were abusable/imbalanced then watch this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eo-gePUCTrs&feature=related.

Why can't people just take the compromise that Bethesda might be trying? Spears~Polearms, they just can't be used as a frontal attack deterrent which allows for constant damage output with no opening for retaliation. Why do you really need spears when you have other polearms that are basically the same thing except not easily abused. I really don't get it.

We don't really know what they'll have. All we know is that as it stands they wont have "spears in the traditional sense" God knows what that means, or how good the umplementation will be ie whether any possible polearm will feel like a spear or like a huuuuuge battleaxe or whatever. Evidence so far are enough to get frustrated if you wanted spears. What we have so far is not enough to say "it's a good thing" unless one simply hated spears. Personally I never used spears, but I do understand the frustration of people who wanted them.

EDIT I see you're not saying it's a good thing in the title. Forgive my mistake.

I don't care what weapons are in, I just want the flow of combat, the combat ITSELF, to be exciting.

If this is a continuation of the http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1164375-no-spears/

I'll post my response to you here, as it was locked before I could post it there.



Well, my point is that Bethesda's developers design the style of combat, and decide its limitations and parameters - it's certainly possible to design a balanced, elegant representation of spear combat into a cRPG, and perhaps that's the real gripe of some of the more reasonable spear fans; they haven't done so.

I'm mostly playing the Devil's Advocate now, though, as I neither expected Bethesda to design their combat around a rather specific, exceptional and tricky weapon, nor would I have preferred such a weapon over other options (ie, bladed polearms) anyway.

Once again, Morrowind was made in a different time, to a different audience, with different older technology compared to Oblivion, NPC's did not bob and weave, or actively block and parry.

Spear combat isnt going to mirror Morrowinds if it was implemented in Oblivon and even more so in Skyrim.

That's more like "why it's okay based on certain assumptions I made".

Personally, I can live without spears. But saying that halberds are better versions of spears is just very narrow-minded. It's a different type of weapon that has its own unique aesthetic, and depending how much effort would go into, it would have its own feel to it too. When facing a single enemy, you can easily keep him at a distance, but you'd be at a disadvantage when fighting many opponents at once. You can't throw a halberd at a dragon. And for mounted combat, it would allow for some cool ride-by moves - if there is such a thing as mounted combat, it would actually be the only weapon players who focus on two-handed weapons can use (though one could argue about the logic of that being governed by the Two Handed skill then).

The main reason I would like spears to appear in the game is mostly the aesthetic aspect though. It's simply nice to see a large variety of weapons on opponents, or in shops. If there is something like an Imperial Legion, it would be the best fitting weapon for them, together with the broadsword.

Well as the other one was locked...

Yes, in fact I did. Hence why my goal was seeking clarification of problems I perceived, while admitting I was coming late into the argument.
Let's keep things friendly, eh?


I am by no means trying to assert that things were perfectly fine and dandy the way they were. If weapon [X] were added into Skyrim, having been featured in any other title, I would fully expect them to rebalance and rework that weapon to fit well with their new overall combat schema.


So in other words,

p1: Rebalancing flawed weapons from previous games will water down content in the new game if those weapons did not share major combat similarities with other weapons.
p2: Spears in Morrowind were flawed weapons, and they did not share combat similarities with other weapons.
p3: Polearms, having not been implemented, are not flawed, and share similarities with 2-handed weapons such as claymores.
p4: Including rebalanced non-similar weapons i.e. spears takes more effort than designing similar weapons i.e. polearms from the ground up.
Therefore: Including polearms will take less effort than including spears.
Does that seem like a fair representation to you? Hopefully, because it's about to get dissected.

Now, issues with...
p1: It entirely depends on how much tweaking needs to be done to the flawed weapon in general (which also depends on the interpretation of the degree of how broken they were to begin with). For example, by this premise, I might say that rebalancing bows from Oblivion will water down content in Skyrim, because bows were admittedly flawed and they share no similarities to any other combat avenue. Spears could easily get small rebalance tweaks just the same as bows are getting, such as that a successful and powerful spear jab takes massive amounts of energy and leaves the player open for attack for a somewhat enlongated window. And there are a multitude of these small little tweaks, some of which just may be the fixing that needs to be done. So now it becomes a dispute of whether the time required to do the fixing is really such a waste, especially for potentially small fixes. I just have to ask, then, were bows a waste of time to fix, and will they water down content as a result?

p4: The problem here, tying in the critiques of p1, is that though the polearm may in fact share similarities with another weapon type already implemented, that by no means necessitates that such an implementation will be easier than fixing something with a foundation (however fractured) already in place. In fact, if the changes to the one with the already-present foundation aren't totally comprehensive, then it just might be the reverse. Adding in the general combat/gameplay mindset that Todd's been expressing for the past few years now, namely that their goal is to create distinctions in how weapons work rather than the weapons themselves, it would seem likely that the similarities between how the claymore works in game versus how the polearm might work in game would shrink. And that would lessen even further the amount of ease to implement polearms rather than spears.

I would argue that neither has an inherent advantage over the other in not taking away from gameplay quantitatively or qualitiatively, and even if they do, trying to assert one to be moreso than the other is completely pointless due to the inherent speculation and assumptions that must be made by the arguer.

I really don't get where this mentality of "spears aren't in because they're unbalanced" comes from. We're talking about spears one of the most widely used melee weapon in human history. One of the first tools invented by man used through history and forming the basis of the bayonet in modern history. If you're going to have a fantasy game, not including spears is almost ridiculous at this point. I'm not asking for something ridiculous like a http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarissa just a simple spear that wouldn't be that hard to implement. OOO added them to Oblivion, and they worked pretty good. I guess I just assumed Bethesda could expand on that aspect...

Hit the nail on the head. I'm sure if Beth thought that spears could be implemented, and would bring something special to the combat in Skyrim, then they would have put the resources into making them a reality.

at that video. Sorry, didn't play Morrowind.

Well seeing that the game doesn't take place on earth, you can't really use earth/human based history as an arguement for the inclusion/exclusion of anything. In Todd's interview he said traditional spears are out so there may be other long weapons in, like halberds, long axe's etc.

I'll get my spear fix in Dark Souls - the sequel to Demons Souls.

He did say in the podcast that spears are not in, in the traditional sense, so I think that means that there will be polearms, but not stabbity spears.

I really want to know how it's narrow-minded. It's narrow-minded for those that cry for spears all the time expect them to make them and not lose out on other weapons while trying to implement them in a balanced way. Spears are in the polearm family, so they aren't that much different, the difference is that spears means of attacking is stabbing, which allows for being able to keep people at a distance without any chance of retaliation due to the spear being between you and the enemy. With polearms, they allow for the same range of attack yet due to their swing, they actually have openings to be retaliated against. Weapons that have equal strengths and weakness are better than those that are nothing but strengths. You just can't have a weapon that excels and owning a single enemy because when someone is fighting a single enemy they will use a spear that makes them trivialized and then switch out for another weapon in a multi-fight. That's not fixing anything, that's just masking it by saying that it's not perfect in multi-fights. I wouldn't hurl a spear at a dragon anyhow, I would be more inclined to sling a javelin, much better balance. To fight dragons, we have dragon shouts, throwing a spear most likely wouldn't hurt a dragon anyhow, it would probably just glance off the scales at a range, you would need a nice bracing to pierce something between scales.

As for them being the only weapon that can be used on mounted combat. Two handed weapons are two handed because they require the two hands as a fulcrum point to bring down as much energy into an attack as possible. Mounted combat is different. You can hold a weapon with one hand off to the side and use the force of the horse to allow the weapon to do the damage instead of the force from the weight of the weapon plus leverage. This is why even in the wars up until the early 20th century people still used sabers because you could hold the saber off to the side and the horses momentum would turn the saber into a far more destructive force than it would be normally.

If we're talking about a game taking place in some messed up reality that doesn't follow normal rules of gravity, inertia, and momentum sure that argument holds true. But we're not, we're talking about a game that mimics real life to a T, and then the differences take place. There's magic, the stars are actually holes in reality, divine beings are real and have actual impact on life, you know things like that. If you're trying to argue that spears don't make sense merely because someone says "in this world they don't work, because because" then that makes no sense to me. If spears literally don't work in this work of fiction, then neither should daggers because they are both stabbing weapons, one being attached to a pole.

I don't mean to sound so nick picky, but this is the first major thing not included in Skyrim that annoys me. I know that I could mod these weapons into the game and have them behave mostly how I wish, but the fact that gamesas isn't doing it themselves and making them work as they should is a disappointment as well as an annoyance. I'll get over it, but this seems like a case of laziness over anything.

@above: Make spears do less damage, have a less chance of staggering, ect and the longer reach is balanced. You make it seem like spears can't be just because they'd be imbalanced. It isn't really that hard to implement something in a balanced or even nerfed state. Hell, I'd prefer a nerfed version making it into the game (kinda like energy weapons in NV) because you can always modify the stats to fix them. Furthermore, this almost seems like the fast travel debate all over again. "No spears because they're imbalanced//no fast travel because it's imbalanced" "then don't use it".

Lazy... yes, I'm sure Beth is being very lazy these days. :rolleyes:

I wasn't trying to argue that spears don't make sense in this world, all I was saying is that you cant use human history as an arguement to include or exlude anything because the game doesn't take place on earth. All other arguements to include spears in the game are valid but this one isn't. That was my point.

If this was something stupid like realistic waste management I'd agree, but considering how much this has been talked about (hell, it was the first question asked because of how much it's been mentioned) shows its something worth implementing.

Not necessarily. Like I said in the last thread,
I loved spears in Morrowind. But I also explicitly stated that I wanted a game that would surpass Morrowind. And it is by no means required that a game reuse anything at all in terms of mechanics from Morrowind to do that.

Spears are pretty cool, but the game still has room to be so much more, with or without them.

Maybe lazy isn't the right term? I'm sure they've worked on it. They're not stupid people, most of the time. If they felt like they could add it without it being a godly weapon, they probably would. Do I want to see it, I don't really care. I like swords better myself. And its a single player game, so as long as there was a way to combat it, it would be fine with me.

And we still don't know exactly what they are doing with spears yet anyway. Todd said they're not doing spears in the clasical sense. That leads me to believe there doing something with them. So who knows.

Isn't this absolute faulty logic - because the spear design for that is in a completely different game? :confused:

new game, new weaponry. I like that idea.

i dont care few weapons while those few feel realistic

Not sure how it was malicious, it was a legitimate question of why you would say "but how will adding spears be quantitatively harmful, yet adding polearms won't?" when it was how adding spears would require the time that would be used on other weapons that might have been cut because of the time needed to balance spears when you can have spear-like weapons that are swings instead of stabs, which is much easier to balance.



Yep, that's exactly what I'm saying.



Sound reasoning that you could use rebalancing bows as an example. The problem is that rebalancing bows went hand in hand with rebalancing magic as well and with that, they made a relatively simple fix with the slowing of backpedaling, which was the obvious problem. The issue with using that as an example also is that it is an entirely different combat aspect then others, it's ranged while spears are under the melee combat aspect and yet are outlandish and broken. As for the changes you suggested, it's possible but the issue of having an attack happen between you and the enemy as a direct jab will cause the ability to use it as a shield by just attacking. As I've said before, time is of the essence in game development and when you can add in a weapon type that is similar to spears yet is much more easily implemented than a spear rework, I don't see the need for spears when it can dilute the rest of the game.



But the problem with that is that just because something has a foundation, it may be easier to build something brand new then try to fix the thing that is fractured in the first place.



The main point of qualitative degeneration is because if spears are returned as they were, they will divert combat from the way it was intended, such as in Morrowind. Those that have played spears can really tell how much easier the game is with spears, ridiculously so. It really just seems the reason that people want spears back is because they were so powerful, which isn't a good reason to bring them back. Yes, thinking of the players is a big part of game design but people also have to make the game in the perspective of the game as a whole. Adding in something on purpose that can easily exploit the game mechanics is just not acceptable. I just showed how it that polearms are similar to spears and gave examples of how they could be implemented without breaking the game.

Keep in mind that there is a perk system that governs all of these weapons. Logically, Bethesda has in mind a set limit of perks, and they know whereabouts how much they want players to be able to specialize with weapons. Let's say every type of weapon has 7 perks. Counting Daggers, Swords, Claymores, Halberds, Maces, Axes and Warhammers, that's roughly 7 different weapon types, combining similar ones into the same perk set (Warhammers and 2H Maces for instance, Halberds and Battleaxes). Assume that, due to balance, there may only be 49 allowed perks, to fit into the idea that players will only get around 50 perks. If we go by that balance, then implementing a separate slot for spears, going on how different it is to everything else, could leach some slots away from the other weapons.

Another reason, perhaps, is that the pace of the combat isn't suited for spears. Going by real life use of spears, they are used for two basic things. One is hunting, where you want a weapon that can attack beasts from afar without them getting close with their sharp claws and teeth. The second is in ancient military formation, where they were used as a wall to attack enemy armies from getting close with their sharp swords and axes. Combat in Skyrim is visceral, gritty, action-oriented, and fast. Spears don't fit in that scenario because they are meant for medium-range combat.

However, I'd still personally like to see spears implemented in some form or another. The more flavor, the better. As long as it's realistic and a reasonable workload for the devs. And after the interview, if Todd didn't know that spears were such a popular concern before, he certainly does now. I have good faith in the man that he listens to his fans. Perhaps not in Skyrim, if it's too late in the game, but certainly down the road, Spears will be more of a priority than they were before.