Melee Fighting Review/Critique. And A "idea" to bridge the gap between defensive and aggressive play. Introducing "Stances" and "weapon abilities"

[PoisonArrows]

Review/Critique Portion: If you have dueled as many times as i have, then you have surely wondered some of the same concepts as i have as you continue to gain skill.


~How do i finish my opponent? We can both parry so easily.

~If i counter attack my enemy can parry that too!

~Fast Hits without a charge added to them deal no damage

~I'm ahead in health, so should i just trade hits with my enemy to win?

~Animation abusing or attack feinting/spinning/Running in circles and hope they take my bait all failed... So now what?

~Hybrid Options/Bring out my bow or magic?

Race Specific Strategies:

Thursar: Pop LifeSteal Clade and Strength Clad and go all in? Wait around for my Passive Regen/Thursar Regen to top me off and play around it.

Oghmir: Use all defensive clades and stand still to out tank opponents damage while trading?

Veelas: Time my hit and run strategy safer? Poke with long reach weapons and master trade timing to get in and out before opponent can touch you. Pretty much
gets out traded from Thursar healing and Oghmir Defense. Does well vs Human since they have thursars shit speed (Unless Khurite) and no clades to help them.

Human:???



In Depth review: once you know how to parry and once you have memorized all of the melee weapon attack animations there really is only so much you can do. It almost feels like it comes down to who has the most patience, it does really feel like that at times when fighting a good player when you are also good. There's no incentive to engage the enemy when i can just poke them as they come into my range, or Parry and go for a counter hit. If my Counter is also parried then we are back to square 1. But as long as i continue to play defensive i have the advantage every single time. Unless i am fighting a big noob who can't parry or gets mauled by animation trickery.


Combat Suggestions Section: Aggressive Stance for when you want to attack and deal more damage, Defensive stance for when you want to parry and counter hit. Please note you can still parry and block without being in defensive stance, but you will get extra benefits to being in defensive stance. You can still attack without being in aggressive stance as well Change the extra attack/defense from the stances to a flat +10% increase to damage or defense depending on what stance you are using. Stance changing takes 3 seconds to do and disables block/parry while it is being done. "Community Edit, Stance Changing now doesn't take 3 seconds is instead immediate and a player is locked in that stance for 10 seconds before they can swap stances again"

Magic Stances: Aggressive Stance: 100% Concentration, Defensive stance: 40% concentration but 200% Cast times, Hybrid Stance: doesn't take 3 seconds to change into and allows a melee weapon in hand, adds +10% Magic damage and +10% melee damage. Armored Stance: Allows no penalty in Heavy Armor, Must wear Heavy armor to use and adds +25% Spell Leech to spells but no additional other benefits. (Spell leech is same thing as life steal but the magic version)


Bowman Stances: LongBowman: Arrows travel twice as far, and deal 2x damage. Melee Bowman: Fires 2 arrows at once if opponent is 10 yards or closer.


There needs to be skills where i can go aggressive and just smash my opponent into dust. Or be more defensive with more reward: To reward players who are aggressive/defensive in the fight. This would give options to the flow of combat and have criteria met before being used.


Aggressive stance: Spear Weapon ability: Shield Pierce: If Opponent uses a Shield and is blocking, the spear pierces through it dealing the full damage. Only works if weapon is fully charged. Works on players blocking with normal weapons as well, goes through parry if aimed at the heart or head.


Aggressive stance: War Hammer/Maul/Sledgehammer ability: HEAVY FORCE: Hits made by these weapons slow down opponents block/parry/counter timing. Good for consecutive hits disabling opponents ability to counter the other blows. If opponent remains blocking before consecutive blows, this will lower their block.


Defensive stance: Spear Weapon ability: Pike Formation Brace: With the Long spear braced outwards it deals extra damage to horses/cavalry. Buckling the horse and rider if aimed at horses legs.


Aggressive Stance: Axe Weapon ability: Executioner: Gains 10% Move speed, against Opponents with 25% Hp or Less. 2nd effect: Execute: If Aimed at opponents head they can not parry/block, and take 10 more damage.


Defensive Stance: Shield Bash: Bashes the enemy with shield dealing damage, also deflects opponents attack if done with great timing. Does more damage with a spiked shield, but a Tower shield flings enemy further away.

Defensive stance: Shield Strike: A quick charge attack that can be used after a Shield bash, damaging a opponent as they are flying through the air from the shield bash.

 

[Woody]

I can appreciate the time and effort gone into this idea, but dont you think this is too radical to fit into the existing gameplay paradigms? A simple kick to counteract a defensive player or a condition system that occurs naturally over the course of the fight would help the duel parrying dilema without impacting group play.

Furthermore:

Stance changing takes 3 seconds to do and disables block/parry while it is being done.

Why would changing your stance prevent you from blocking/parrying, this would feel janky and mechanically bad?

In summary, your "stance" in playing aggressive or defensive happens naturally through your decision to swing or parry. So im not a fan im afraid!

 

[Omightis]

Review/Critique Portion: If you have dueled as many times as i have, then you have surely wondered some of the same concepts as i have as you continue to gain skill.


~How do i finish my opponent? We can both parry so easily.

~If i counter attack my enemy can parry that too!

~Fast Hits without a charge added to them deal no damage

~I'm ahead in health, so should i just trade hits with my enemy to win?

~Animation abusing or attack feinting/spinning/Running in circles and hope they take my bait all failed... So now what?

~Hybrid Options/Bring out my bow or magic?

Race Specific Strategies:

Thursar: Pop LifeSteal Clade and Strength Clad and go all in? Wait around for my Passive Regen/Thursar Regen to top me off and play around it.

Oghmir: Use all defensive clades and stand still to out tank opponents damage while trading?

Veelas: Time my hit and run strategy safer? Poke with long reach weapons and master trade timing to get in and out before opponent can touch you. Pretty much
gets out traded from Thursar healing and Oghmir Defense. Does well vs Human since they have thursars shit speed (Unless Khurite) and no clades to help them.

Human:???



In Depth review: once you know how to parry and once you have memorized all of the melee weapon attack animations there really is only so much you can do. It almost feels like it comes down to who has the most patience, it does really feel like that at times when fighting a good player when you are also good. There's no incentive to engage the enemy when i can just poke them as they come into my range, or Parry and go for a counter hit. If my Counter is also parried then we are back to square 1. But as long as i continue to play defensive i have the advantage every single time. Unless i am fighting a big noob who can't parry or gets mauled by animation trickery.


Combat Suggestions Section: Aggressive Stance for when you want to attack and deal more damage, Defensive stance for when you want to parry and counter hit. Please note you can still parry and block without being in defensive stance, but you will get extra benefits to being in defensive stance. You can still attack without being in aggressive stance as well Change the extra attack/defense from the stances to a flat +10% increase to damage or defense depending on what stance you are using. Stance changing takes 3 seconds to do and disables block/parry while it is being done.

Magic Stances: Aggressive Stance: 100% Concentration, Defensive stance: 40% concentration but 200% Cast times, Hybrid Stance: doesn't take 3 seconds to change into and allows a melee weapon in hand, adds +10% Magic damage and +10% melee damage. Armored Stance: Allows no penalty in Heavy Armor, Must wear Heavy armor to use and adds +25% Spell Leech to spells but no additional other benefits. (Spell leech is same thing as life steal but the magic version)


Bowman Stances: LongBowman: Arrows travel twice as far, and deal 2x damage. Melee Bowman: Fires 2 arrows at once if opponent is 10 yards or closer.


There needs to be skills where i can go aggressive and just smash my opponent into dust. Or be more defensive with more reward: To reward players who are aggressive/defensive in the fight. This would give options to the flow of combat and have criteria met before being used.


Aggressive stance: Spear Weapon ability: Shield Pierce: If Opponent uses a Shield and is blocking, the spear pierces through it dealing the full damage. Only works if weapon is fully charged. Works on players blocking with normal weapons as well, goes through parry if aimed at the heart or head.


Aggressive stance: War Hammer/Maul/Sledgehammer ability: HEAVY FORCE: Hits made by these weapons slow down opponents block/parry/counter timing. Good for consecutive hits disabling opponents ability to counter the other blows. If opponent remains blocking before consecutive blows, this will lower their block.


Defensive stance: Spear Weapon ability: Pike Formation Brace: With the Long spear braced outwards it deals extra damage to horses/cavalry. Buckling the horse and rider if aimed at horses legs.


Aggressive Stance: Axe Weapon ability: Executioner: Gains 10% Move speed, against Opponents with 25% Hp or Less. 2nd effect: Execute: If Aimed at opponents head they can not parry/block, and take 10 more damage.


Defensive Stance: Shield Bash: Bashes the enemy with shield dealing damage, also deflects opponents attack if done with great timing. Does more damage with a spiked shield, but a Tower shield flings enemy further away.

Defensive stance: Shield Strike: A quick charge attack that can be used after a Shield bash, damaging a opponent as they are flying through the air from the shield bash.

Hey Poison Arrow,

Yours truly here, Omightis. I really like some points of your idea but there are some that i just don't think will work in a game like Mortal Online 2 due to the graphic designs and paradigms of the game. So regarding different stances giving players pertinent positive and negatives due to the lack of "Creativity" in fight is not a bad idea, i actually like the idea that aggressive stance will reward those that fight agrressively, same with defensive stance, etc. Now the problem is, changing stances is 3 seconds and your vulnerable in those 3 seconds, i think that is pretty broken. For example in a 1v1 duel 3 seconds is more than enough to land multiple decisive blows on your opponent unless their a veela that ran 100 yards just to change stances, but than that means the other opponent is doing the same thing? i believe this would add negatives to the flow of the fight instead of making it smooth. Now if those stances had those buffs as a passive than fine, for example if you just had 100 points on aggressive stance tha you automatically get 10% more damage bonus, but then that means thursars would have 43% damage bonus and the fact that one class will just be broken by this 1 mechanic, than that means the whole game will be lopsided lol.

I can see this working with tad changes to your idea. For example, i don't think axes should do automatically 10+ damage if its aimed at the head which also disallows your opponent to not parry, i think this is crazy broken lol. I think if you added synergy with stances then maybe this can work. For example if you have defensive stance and you carry a shield, then you get a shield bash. If you have aggressive stance and you carry an axe, then you perhaps you can overhead and it'll cause severe blunt damage. If the stance synergies with the weapon than it should toggle something for that opponent however changing stances should deff not take 3 seconds.

Overall, i think you have a fantastic idea that just needs a bit tweaking to match the metta and the flow of the game to where its optimal and not broken. So, I have been working on a simple idea which i actually think complements yours, parrying should be a primary skill. Once you get to 100 points placed in parry, then you have the ability to stagger your opponent which creates an opening, this gives the players the ability to make openings instead of parrying all day long if your both good. I think it solves your issue as well . Thank you for the great read, MO2 needs more people like yourself that are creative and consistently make ideas for the betterment of the game.


- Omightis

 

[PoisonArrows]

I can appreciate the time and effort gone into this idea, but dont you think this is too radical to fit into the existing gameplay paradigms? A simple kick to counteract a defensive player or a condition system that occurs naturally over the course of the fight would help the duel parrying dilema without impacting group play.

Furthermore:



Why would changing your stance prevent you from blocking/parrying, this would feel janky and mechanically bad?

In summary, your "stance" in playing aggressive or defensive happens naturally through your decision to swing or parry. So im not a fan im afraid!

A few things to note: Star Vault already said they will add a special attack to each weapon so we are half way through this idea coming to fruition already. As for the Stance changes taking 3 seconds in my head it was to make it so if you wanted to do the special attacks from defense you had to be in that stance and vise versa for aggressive stance, but wouldn't limit the player otherwise in how they fight. It was overall just a rough idea i had in my head, i make a lot of these things and sometimes they don't even get any replies. But Melee combat at higher level feels really stale and i hope they do something with it to give us some sort of special attacks or something to mix things up a bit. Also one more thing to note, Mo1 had Spear stance but for the life of me i have no idea what it even did. A lot of the skills were bugged for half the games life span... On that note, there existed Double Strike and Triple Strike but they were limited to Fist or Dagger weapons and were also bugged half the time. They might even still be bugged to this day lol.

 

[PoisonArrows]

Hey Poison Arrow,

Yours truly here, Omightis. I really like some points of your idea but there are some that i just don't think will work in a game like Mortal Online 2 due to the graphic designs and paradigms of the game. So regarding different stances giving players pertinent positive and negatives due to the lack of "Creativity" in fight is not a bad idea, i actually like the idea that aggressive stance will reward those that fight agrressively, same with defensive stance, etc. Now the problem is, changing stances is 3 seconds and your vulnerable in those 3 seconds, i think that is pretty broken. For example in a 1v1 duel 3 seconds is more than enough to land multiple decisive blows on your opponent unless their a veela that ran 100 yards just to change stances, but than that means the other opponent is doing the same thing? i believe this would add negatives to the flow of the fight instead of making it smooth. Now if those stances had those buffs as a passive than fine, for example if you just had 100 points on aggressive stance tha you automatically get 10% more damage bonus, but then that means thursars would have 43% damage bonus and the fact that one class will just be broken by this 1 mechanic, than that means the whole game will be lopsided lol.

I can see this working with tad changes to your idea. For example, i don't think axes should do automatically 10+ damage if its aimed at the head which also disallows your opponent to not parry, i think this is crazy broken lol. I think if you added synergy with stances then maybe this can work. For example if you have defensive stance and you carry a shield, then you get a shield bash. If you have aggressive stance and you carry an axe, then you perhaps you can overhead and it'll cause severe blunt damage. If the stance synergies with the weapon than it should toggle something for that opponent however changing stances should deff not take 3 seconds.

Overall, i think you have a fantastic idea that just needs a bit tweaking to match the metta and the flow of the game to where its optimal and not broken. So, I have been working on a simple idea which i actually think complements yours, parrying should be a primary skill. Once you get to 100 points placed in parry, then you have the ability to stagger your opponent which creates an opening, this gives the players the ability to make openings instead of parrying all day long if your both good. I think it solves your issue as well . Thank you for the great read, MO2 needs more people like yourself that are creative and consistently make ideas for the betterment of the game.


- Omightis

Ah it seems a lot of people actually like this idea i came up with. But aren't a fan of the 3 seconds rule. So instead i have thought of a improvement. Rather then taking 3 seconds to change stances, perhaps there is a 10 second cooldown where a player must remain in a stance before they can immediately switch to another stance. Your thoughts on this idea?


Also Omightis the Axe idea only works if opponent is 25% hp or lower and all the skills i put they need either aggressive stance or defensive stance before they can use that skill. So hitting opponents head every time without them being able to parry wouldn't actually work unless they are 25% or less hp. Also if you think about it if they know they are already fucked lol they will probably try to trade hits as a means of survival anyway at that point but +10 damage if you land a head shot would give the axe fighter a slight advantage in that trade. So i mean during the trade they might hit for 30 and axe hits for 40 as example.


Oh yes i thought of another Axe skill called Sever: Deals more damage if aimed at opponents limbs, particularly their elbows or Knees.


To your idea, yes that is what the game is missing is there is "No opening" in the flow of combat and what made me want to think of ideas in the first place. The combat is too stale and i would highly argue that the player going aggressive has a huge disadvantage. Not only do you open yourself up to a counter blow, you also reveal your attack pattern which can be analyzed quicker... "Pushes up my glasses" You notice the advantage to the defensive player even more, Especially if you use Polearms/Spears like i do. For example you get more equipment hits if the opponent is right near your face, and so i like to keep my distance and trade most of my hits while i see them charging theirs. It seems to work the first few duels and then i figure them out and they figure me out and then we are just awkwardly moving back and forth trying to trick each other and the damn duel drags on forever because neither of us can land a hit anymore. And the only trick i know of to hit while they are about to, stops working because they have that parry on clutch and are ready for everything after seeing how i fight a few times. It's at this point where if i have any hp advantage at all, i decide i gotta go for it but god have mercy if you try going aggressive how the hell do you kill the guy lol if nothing is working. Lmao

 

[PoisonArrows]

I can appreciate the time and effort gone into this idea, but dont you think this is too radical to fit into the existing gameplay paradigms? A simple kick to counteract a defensive player or a condition system that occurs naturally over the course of the fight would help the duel parrying dilema without impacting group play.

Furthermore:



Why would changing your stance prevent you from blocking/parrying, this would feel janky and mechanically bad?

In summary, your "stance" in playing aggressive or defensive happens naturally through your decision to swing or parry. So im not a fan im afraid!

Ah it seems a lot of people actually like this idea i came up with. But aren't a fan of the 3 seconds rule nor the lack of parry/block. So instead i have thought of a improvement. Rather then taking 3 seconds to change stances, perhaps there is a 10 second cooldown where a player must remain in a stance before they can immediately switch to another stance. Your thoughts on this idea?

 

[Woody]

A few things to note: Star Vault already said they will add a special attack to each weapon so we are half way through this idea coming to fruition already.

Of course and I'm sure there's some inspiration they can draw from here.

Ah it seems a lot of people actually like this idea i came up with. But aren't a fan of the 3 seconds rule nor the lack of parry/block. So instead i have thought of a improvement. Rather then taking 3 seconds to change stances, perhaps there is a 10 second cooldown where a player must remain in a stance before they can immediately switch to another stance. Your thoughts on this idea?

While I'm not sold on stances, this would be better mechanically yes.

 

[PoisonArrows]

Of course and I'm sure there's some inspiration they can draw from here.



While I'm not sold on stances, this would be better mechanically yes.

Not trying to toot my own horn, but i do believe they have taken inspiration from many ideas i have posted here. My favorite was the Wagon idea though i came up with like a year ago. On a side note: Does anyone actually remember what Spear Stance in Mo1 did? For the life of me i can't remember.