Does TES need an overhaul of combat?

[SpaceBat]

Bethesda have gotten damn good at environments, there really is barely any rehash in Skyrim - but yeah, put the Metroid team on enemy variety

But most sidequests (and even quite a few main quests) take place in dungeons, which, aside from a few differences, are usually incredibly similar to eachother. I'll agree that the overworld is pretty well done, though.

But don't even get me started on the damn Draugr

 

[James Joseph Emerald]

I didn't personally see much wrong with the Witcher 1 (enhanced edition) translation though. Then again, I don't remember any good lines bar one from playing for 50+ damn hours either, so it mustn't have been too great.

Well, one very bizarre issue is that characters always deliver an opening line whenever you initiate conversation with them, and the way dialogue is programmed, you re-initiative conversation after discussing each topic. Plus they run out of ideas for opening lines very quick, so some of them are just weird on their own. Example:

[Geralt approaches a Gardner]
Gardner: Look how they grow...
Geralt: I'm here about the notice.
Gardner: I need 5 echinops bulbs for my garden.
Geralt: I'll find them for you.
Gardner: Look how they grow...
Geralt: Do you play dice poker?
Gardner: Yes, I'll give you a game any time you wish!
Gardner: Look how they grow...
Geralt: I should be going.

There's no way I could even pretend that's a normal conversation.
Also, a lot of the voice actors (Geralt's in particular) seem to have trouble emoting.
They took the Mass Effect engine, you'd think they could at least keep the decent dialogue system.

Damnit, it almost depresses me that one could invent all these different ways to put immersion, realism and balance to such a minor part of the game as "consumables", but they'll never be implemented into the game.

What I never understood is how, there are people whose job it is to think of this stuff, yet this stuff never seems well thought-out. It took us about 15 minutes between us to devise a better mechanic which could probably be coded into the game in half an hour tops. Is game development really that dysfunctional that it hampers the ability to fix trivially solvable problems?

 

[Risingblade]

I actually like the first person combat, I'm sick of that 3rd person combat shit, takes away the immersion I feel when I play in first person.

 

[Lunar Templar]

yes, it does.

and a decent story wouldn't hurt ether

 

[SajuukKhar]

I am so disappointed at the Hearthfire DLC and how they focus on crap like cooking, adoption, marriage etc.

I play TES to dick around in a fantasy world, not to manage a household and do boring crap like in the Sims.

So what your saying is you want a fantasy world, but you don't want the things that actually make the world something beyond a combat-area world, which considering you hate the combat one would think you would want less of that to do?

there is a reason crap like house mods, and cooking mods, and those "you need to eat/drink" mods are so popular.

 

[Jaeke]

The third person view for combat is a good idea. TES already has an option for 3rd person view, so fix that clunky thing and make a good combat system.

Alternative: make combat more like the combat found in DMOM&M. Then you can keep first person always and the game won't suck.

DMOM&M? What is that and how does the combat work?

Dark Messiah: Heroes of Might & Magic.

It's basicly the same thing except you can kick people into spikes which are somehow in every building in the world but appearently it means it's better than TES combat.

OT: Seriously...

This "TES COMBAT IS SHITE" is rediculous.

Batman: Arkham Asylum/City does the same but with the X and Y button but it's called "masterful" because they make it look pretty.

Combat is combat is combat, and is combat. It's not pretty or smooth and that's the point. They've made it abundantly clear that the combat is reflective the harsh brutality of the landscape.

If you are spamming potions then either go level up or lower the difficulty, which people don't have a problem with Batman because in all honesty that game's combat is easy as hell.

You really think the only difference between Dark Messiah combat and TeS combat is the fact that you can kick people? Perhaps it is time you watched some Dark Messiah gameplay on youtube, because there are way more than that.

Also same to your comparison to the Arkham games, because I know that it's an opinion, but in this instance, your opinion is just wrong.

I've played through Dark Messiah twice. Once on Xbox and once on my PC. The latter being the most recent, about 6 months ago.

I've played and completed both Arkham games.

I love both of these games and as I said their combat is great fun. What I fail to understand is how it is proper to compare a third person action based and highly maneuverable combat style (Batman) to a first-person sword/magic based duel-wielding play style (Skyrim).

In the case of Dark Messiah, the combat is fun and great for its place (go play Dishonored and you'll see the true testament of that play style) but it was really the only "good" thing about the game. Everything else was meh.

Again, The Elder Scrolls doesn't need a revamp of its combat. It's fine the way it is and highly flexible to match people's playstyles and needs, either through its own vanilla and setting or through mods.

 

[Get_A_Grip_]

Yeah, it needs some improvement in the combat section.
Perhaps if it borrowed the swordplay from Chivalry then the combat would feel more meaty and not as floaty.

 

[meepop]

A third-person character can roll out of the way to avoid an enemy's jab, something that would be disorienting in first-person. They can pull off athletic moves like running along walls or jumping off enemies, something that would be nearly impossible to control in first-person. They can move around with a sense of gymnastics that makes first-person characters look slow and unresponsive in comparison.

Mirror's Edge. Just... Mirror's Edge. Rolling, running along walls, vaulting. And the game doesn't do them terribly either. Yeah, I know. There's not much real combat in Mirror's Edge, but quite a bit of rolling and whatnot is required. I do understand what you mean, however.

OT: Yeah, I stopped playing it because combat was rather repetitive and boring. That's not to say I didn't get a good play-time out of it, but... Really, bows and spells tended to prioritize over melee anyway. Demon's Souls did it quite well, with the weapons all having a unique feel. I think what the system needs is more responsiveness. Even in games like T2, weapons feel like they have weight behind them. The look and feel of the weapons in Skyrim is basically just everyone hitting everyone else with weapons. There's not much staggering, or cutting, or anything like that. That's probably part of how they were able to pull off the amazing world geography.

 

[Kevin7557]

Frankly, combat in TES is crap, no disputing it. It's mechanically broken, and incredibly boring to boot. You just wail on your enemies to die whilst tabbing out to drink healing potions occasionally. There are a ton of exploits you can use completely accidentally without minmaxing and there's not any spacial awareness or positioning at all. There's also very little difference between various weapons. It's probably my least favourite part of the games.

Having started Dark Souls recently, I've realised how much more fun, rewarding and in depth the combat is. Every weapon feels completely different and there are a variety of moves you can do. Spacial positioning is incredibly important as is verticality and knowing when to dodge and when to parry. It's a lot more fun and rewarding than TES combat.

Now I'm not saying to make TES combat like Dark Souls, incredibly unforgiving and brutal, but do you think it should be more like Dark Souls, rewarding positioning, learning the moveset of your weapon, and the patterns of attack of your enemies and generally making it better than just wailing on your enemies?

Would you like to see the system changed/improved or would it ruin the franchise?

For me I'd love to see it changed, the combat isn't the thing that makes the games unique, it's the exploration that's the key to the series.

PS: Dungeons are crap in TES, they should have them much more non-linear, unique and complex like in older games like Baldur's Gate...thoughts?

First the combat in Demon Souls the game Dark Soul is a sequel too (though Namco Bandai will NEVER ADMIT THIS) had vastly superior combat to Dark Souls and actually required skill over avoid being hit first. False King from Demon Souls would literally kill every boss from Dark Souls and you were expected to still be capable of beating him in a fair fight.

For that reason I consider Dark Souls Mainstreamed combat (Namco Bandai said the game was Mainstreamed to give it a broader appeal) is in fact broken as it often felt cheap or as if the game had cheated you vs Demon Soul's combat which made you feel as if you had been defeated by a superior opponent and you needed to surpass them

Second you are wrong about the combat in TES being broken and it being indisputable especially since you based the argument on a crappy sequel to a great game. For the same reason that Dark Soul's Combat was atrocious, IE the mainstreaming to make it accessible or rather sell able to more people.

The core of the combat system though is in fact superior to Dark Souls since TES Skyrim offers more workable selection while also offering stat buffs and bonuses to its weapons. It would not take much work to simply tweak the combat system to include limb damage and weapon degradation especially since Fallout series, which uses the same engine, does so spectacularly. Again proving that the Core of the Combat is actually quite superior if under utilized in Skyrim.

Personally while I have clocked over nearly 600 hours in Vanilla Skyrim it is obvious the game was rushed to meet that cheeky deadline as several systems are present on disk such as the economy feature discussed in previews but locked away because they break the game.

Unlike Dark Souls which continues to devolve to become easier with each update, Skyrim is constantly improving. In the next expansion we are likely to see new weapons types including spears.

 

[babinro]

Without a doubt.

I thought Oblivion's combat felt dated.

It was extremely disappointing to find out that Skyrim's combat was almost unchanged by comparison. Lackluster combat is one of the main reasons why I gave up on Skyrim inside 65 hours. The world has more lore to discover but the gameplay isn't fun enough to warrant the time.

 

[Zykon TheLich_v1legacy]

A third-person character can roll out of the way to avoid an enemy's jab, something that would be disorienting in first-person.

You may or may not know this, but there is a roll move (at least in oblivion). Block + direction + jump IIRC. The camera doesn't spin or anything stupid like that, it just does a very quick jump to your new position but if you watch in 3rd person you see the character roll to the side or do a front or back flip. You can use it to jump in, slash, slash, slash and then jump out of range again before they hit you back if you time it right and judge the distance well.

OT: There are mods that include a target lock on the PC which is one of the things I hated about the combat, if you have an enemy that tries to get behind you, you can end up just spinning in circles randomly slashing in an attempt to see the fucker, let alone hit them, so a target lock would definitely help.

 

[SajuukKhar]

I think the fact that this mod

Duel - Combat Realism: http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/2700

exists, and works almost entirely be simply modifying values already present in the game engine, shows that the system doesn't need an overhaul, the values just need to be tweaked.

 

[likalaruku]

I can't speak for Skyrim, since I'm still holding out for GOTY, but I had no problem with the combat in Oblivion. It's not "too easy" when a guy with a sword is literally running around you in circles.

 

[SajuukKhar]

No. The engine is just dogshit. Just "tweeking the values" ain't cutting it. It needs a complete overhaul.

The mod proves otherwise.

though i suspect you wouldn't be happy until they make the game an isometric with turn-based dice-roll combat.

 

[Norrdicus]

Well, one very bizarre issue is that characters always deliver an opening line whenever you initiate conversation with them, and the way dialogue is programmed, you re-initiative conversation after discussing each topic. Plus they run out of ideas for opening lines very quick, so some of them are just weird on their own. Example:

[Geralt approaches a Gardner]
Gardner: Look how they grow...
Geralt: I'm here about the notice.
Gardner: I need 5 echinops bulbs for my garden.
Geralt: I'll find them for you.
Gardner: Look how they grow...
Geralt: Do you play dice poker?
Gardner: Yes, I'll give you a game any time you wish!
Gardner: Look how they grow...
Geralt: I should be going.

There's no way I could even pretend that's a normal conversation.

Okay, in this case I get you, and Witcher 2 has improved on that

Also, a lot of the voice actors (Geralt's in particular) seem to have trouble emoting.

Geralt gets much better in Witcher 2. Still rather monotone, but in a way that seems appropriate. Check this animated short (no spoilers)

They took the Mass Effect engine, you'd think they could at least keep the decent dialogue system.

Err, no, Witcher 1 doesn't use the Mass Effect engine, in fact, Mass Effect simply uses Unreal Engine 3, like the most common engine of 7th gen gaming.

Witcher 1 uses Aurora Engine, the Neverwinter Nights engine

 

[Cheeseless]

I think TES would benefit from adding some proper collision physics into their combat. As it stands now the weapons all feel the same not only because of the mostly identical animations, but also because they just carry the animation in front of everything else on the screen with no effect on the enemy. What little effects there seem to be are preset "hurt" and "block" animations.

A strange but good couple of examples in which proper physical reaction to blows is implemented are Toribash and Overgrowth. In the first one, the entire point of the system is that it is purely physics based with player control only over the fighter's joints, therefore having no set animations of any kind. In Overgrowth there are animations, but the effects of striking an opponent are calculated within the physics engine, then translated into the damage system, which leads to a blocking arm being thrown aside by a kick, or an entire enemy's body sailing over the ground from a roundhouse kick and snapping their neck against the wall, not because the animation is for kicking someone into the wall, but because it calculated the momentum of the enemy from the kick it received.

It seems that TES never has had this because of their humble beginnings in now decades old computers, but killing blows on enemies sometimes causes them to ragdollize according to the blow received so why not have it so EVERY blow belongs to this system?

 

[Cheeseless]

Double post. please remove this one if possible.