Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Comments
This was beautiful to watch. I've been following this game since Kickstarter and to see the combat go from early days to this....wow. Amazing!
I LIKE
I loved most of what I saw. Character model looked amazing. Character, armor, the weapons! The weapons looked so freakin good. I love the art style. The audio work is top notch, love it all.
Things that are OK
I understand this is a first iteration, but I'd like to see more reaction from hits. Most likely you guys already have planned a sort of "stagger" statistic where you can stun and knock off balance. Or even weapon type stuff, eg hammers stagger more than daggers...obviously.
Things I'd like to see changed
Sword glow/glint was too bright. Also would like to know is that glint based on the class or weapon type? If you as a team want to keep this type of thing in game, as a player i'd like the option to either turn it off or scale it.
Slow. It. Down. The sword hits are still too fast. Slow it down by like 20% across the board and you'd be a real sexy spot imo. Somewhere between where you're at and ESO speed, as in ESO is a little too slow imo. Sadly both look very similar tho as they are super floaty and neither the character or the enemy show any reaction to the hits. This is a tricky thing which I'm sure you know, action combat
FInal Thoughts and Hopes for Next Combat Showing
Over all I'm super impressed and happy with where the combat is going, keep on trucking where you're going and I'm sure the final product will be great!
What I'd personally like to see in the next combat showing is how is the tab target style combat coming along? And show all combat with UI enabled. And perhaps some explanation on how a tab target player will get the same speed and mobility as an action player.
Thanks again Intrepid! Keep it up
The on-hit visual and sound effects will be equally critical to giving combat a sense of impact. I liked the crunch on the stone golems, and spray of dust. On other creatures, both a grunt and slash/crunch (depending on armor) and tiny blood effect would be ideal. If the receiving model can have a subtle flinch animation that doesn't interfere with its mechanics (perhaps a slight movement wobble in whatever its currently doing) that would also be excellent!
Damage Number stickiness, size growth animation, and the ease-in-out speed as it rolls upward is looking better as well! Perhaps larger crits could stick longer (while new numbers keep rolling underneath), and maybe have a little more bold/width in the font. However, any XP/Gold/loot/quest-tracker etc text probably shouldn't use the same animation style and should just be smaller static sized text that scrolls evenly slightly offset from where the damage numbers are.
This is something that you'll run into in ESO (elder scrolls online) quite often and it ends up feeling extremely floaty and excessive in terms of key input etc.
But overall it looks extremely promising so props to the team for their work!
To me, when you have to do that chain 10 times in a row to kill a higher HP mob, it feels awkward and repetitive. The solution to this in my opinion is either;
A ) Make auto attacks one single hit or two quick hits that changes animation to keep variety. The reason I like this option is because the final hit in a one, two.. three combo often feels like a required part of your auto attack chain. It just does significantly more damage than the other two hits. It's annoying to feel like I have to finish that chain before using an ability. Focusing on one hit auto attacks would give more freedom for weaving abilities and movement between attacks. This would also force your auto-attack buff style abilities to be more impactful.. But I think that's cool. It also makes attack speed a strong attribute to stack. Careful with that.
B ) Make more variety of auto attack chains. Using a variety of left and right clicks, or other button presses to create different target combos or chains. This makes decision making more important especially during PVP, although it would be more difficult to implement on your end. Some examples would be [1 2 3 4 > ability cancel anywhere in chain], [1.. > ability cancel], and what you already have [1 2.. 3! > no ability cancel]. Keep in mind, too much variety here can be really frustrating too. So maybe only two or three variants.
C ) Allow me to "Charge" any part of the 3 hit chain to wind up the attack for a bigger hit, that I could then cancel into an ability unless it's the final BIG charge attack. Also give the ability to cancel the charging animation into whatever I want. This would bring a lot of creativity in PVP. Changing the timing and strength of your attacks makes blocking and movement a more important and dynamic mechanic.
Thanks for considering my opinion if you did!
I think Y'all may want to go and have separate block animations for weapon types.
I like the weighting of the different weapons ex: daggers are fast and fluid/Greatsword is slower but powerful
TY for showing combat numbers
Since I haven't been able to mess around with it myself yet that's all I can give you guys
Amazing job and keep up the great work!
I know this is a first iteration and is probably already being worked on, but those leg animations for daggers seem kinda wonky. Mainly the moving while attacking one where the legs seem to just move rather awkwardly.
I really enjoyed the greatsword from alpha 1 so it's a little sad to me to see the swing speed turned down so much. It definitely looks impactful and hits harder because of the slow swing speed, but it seems like it would be all too easy for someone to move out of the way in pvp. I'm not sure if attack speed is going to be a stat that is put on items but I hope it is as the heavy weapons are definitely going to need it.
I would love to know if you're locked into movement during a swing animation. I know they said you can transition mid combo and that they wanted players to be able to have full control on motion, but the greatsword attack animation while moving forward seemed to have a slow effect at the start and then lurch forward during the swing. What I'm wondering is if we will be locked into the forward lurch during the swing or will we be able to change direction mid swing, not just mid combo.
I also noticed there was an active block animation but it didn't seem to reduce the number. I hope it is intended to reduce damage or perhaps he just was already taking minimal damage.
The last thing I wanted to say is not related to the attack animations but rather the death animations. I always hate when I'm grinding a certain area and I can't tell when a mob is dead. Those giant rock golems seem to just pause for a few seconds before actually falling apart. I absolutely loved watching those small ones explode into little pieces and ragdoll away, that's a clear indication that you can move onto the next enemy group and I hope that something similar can be made for most other enemies.
• Sound and animation is KEY for responsive, satisfying and weighty feeling, NOT animation lock, i like it but can be improved, seems like it goes in the right direction though.
• Hold for parry/block? Idk how i feel about this, doesn't feel too awsome but idk.
• The movement feels kinda fast pace and zoomie, I personally like specifically the movement with the dodges and teleports to be a minimum, but what i have seen it's not too much i think.
• The damage numbers were kinda high? 2k + hits seems kinda high if this is not max level. I like health and damage to be in the 0-10k range. Above that feels too much. It's not as awsome to finally reach the 1k hits than the 200k and so on.
• I like how the character looks and moves, how he holds the sword and walk/run around, this is something that i think is underrated how important it is for the feeling. That the running animation matches the speed you are traveling forward, the feet touches the ground, how he holds his weapons and so on.
-One thing i saw from an earlier update was how the shield was held that i disliked heavy. It was held with his arm straight down in a relaxed position, sure it's probably how someone would hold a shield when out of combat but it lookes SO MUCH BETTER if you hold up the shield with the arm in a 90° angle.
• Death animation of the rock bois were awsome!
Do you feel anything is missing from the basic melee weapon attacks we’ve shared so far? So far i would say the main thing for me that feels lacking is impact, the animations look good but it didn't look like there was much impact from the attacks on the enemies.
Are there types of basic melee weapon attacks in other games that you feel are done well? If so, in what ways? The basic melee attacks in WoW and New World feel good to use and impactful.
Is there anything in particular you’re excited or concerned about regarding what was shown with basic melee weapon attacks? The weapons looked really good but one thing I will say is that the 2 handed sword attacks seem a tad too fast and needs a little something extra to have that feeling of hits impacting the enemy.
Please don't change this it again, ignore people asking for continuous change don't remove effects or water it down... just Move forward with the game the combat, build up, get the rest done and GG! it's looking great people will always complain about something. much love!
Meaning....
shield + one handed weapon - higher defense but slower mobility, attack speed, lower dmg, etc
dual wielding - lower defense but higher dmg, attack speed but lower mobility, etc
1 one handed weapon - lower defense and dmg but higher mobility, better cast speed, lighter in weight, etc
I would love to see just 1 one-handed combat style
I'm glad it's not auto-attacks like in wow or runescape and we can actually be active and engaged with it.
My only major criticism is make the large weapons slower because it felt like you were swinging around a light rapier rather than a greatsword.
was impressed with the decal on the attack 1 and attack 3 animation of the greatsword in the ground i wouldnt mind them staying there for a little longer like 1-5mins so you can see the scars of recent battles/fights but i think that may be a performance issue but it it not would be nice to see.
Extra note: The small golem death animation where there stones fly backwards was very satisfying
It looks a little fast, but that might have just been due to the quick kill times, so I'll wait and see.
Only suggestion would be more of an effect when your character is hit. Pushed back by a huge mob? Maybe spray some dirt by the feet, or dust.
LOVED the floor weapon decal. Loved the movement. Great job, team.
If the general combat will be like that, count me in playing.
We love every single one of you beautiful people over at everyone at Intrepid Studios!!!
A big hat off to you, and I hope to see the development continuing at the same pace as this past year!
Greetings,
YeXiu1
One of the combos for greatsword was too fast , the one that he rotates 360º and cleaves .
overall i really like this approach and looking forward to the alpha 2.
The only real issue for me was the 3rd swing of the 2h sword combo attack. It felt like the animation was so quick that the weapon pretty much "teleported". It felt almost like stop-motion animation and made me lose track of both the sword's position and where the character was facing for half a second.
The stop-motion like animations is specifically why I don't like Black Desert's (otherwise great) combat. To me it feels like a cheap way to add speed/impact to an attack. All the other animations that were shown off - for both weapons - had varying speeds of gradual movement, and the position of the weapons were visible on every frame. (The slash effect helped a lot with that as well, great job on that!)
UPDATE: After re-watching the VoD on YouTube in "native" quality, it seems considerably better than it was on stream. (It probably had to do with Twitch's bitrate.) Although I am happy to see that stop-motion is clearly not the team's intention, I still feel that it was inconsistent with the all the other attack animations that were shown. I am also a bit concerned about how fast animations like this will look for people who can't play the game on high refresh rate monitors, or at least at stable 60 FPS.
Some nits:
==> To have different and distinguished skill animations for the different classes. I would prefer to have a unique skill for some weapons but I understood from the stream this will not be happening, which is good actually. But in this case: how the different weapons from the same type will be better? Only by statistics?
Do you feel anything is missing from the basic melee weapon attacks we’ve shared so far?
==> Need more info.
Are there types of basic melee weapon attacks in other games that you feel are done well? If so, in what ways?
==> You already did great job making the basic melee of this (great sword?!) very satisfying. Since i don't play it and i cannot really "feel" it, but from the stream it looks heavy and realistic without being too realistic. btw L2 did something great: the player had a skill to cast/perform even if they are waiting, staying. For example: some quick self buff between the attacks, some draining of particular statistic in order to boost other.
Is there anything in particular you’re excited or concerned about regarding what was shown with basic melee weapon attacks?
==> The sword is feeling heavy enough and the fight is at good pacing.
==> The decals on the ground are super cool, but will there be an option to turn them off, in order to improve the performance if needed
==> The movement looks fast and smooth , will there be a difference if you're a different class with different armor and weapons? (just curious, is there a navmesh on the rocks, can you move on the rocks that we saw on the stream as well? And what happens if the npcs are not able to see you any more? is there something like LKP ? Can you hide behind the rocks?)
==> (something not exactly basic melee attack related): You said it's animation driven. What about the skills and spells? Will there be a cast bar? In FF14 for ex there is a difference between the animation and the cast bar, so you can't really rely on the animation, you have to watch for the cast bar, which is very annoying.
Overall it looks awesome! Really really awesome! Can't wait for A2!GJ!
- Basic attacks to me are the foundation of combat in which abilities are mixed in. Unlocking more abilities should not make basic attacks redundant and as beautifully demonstrated in the video basic attacks need to fit the class and the playstyle of the class.
- I dont think i missed anything for now, although i'd love to see different styles or weapons and how they feel and look visually.
- I like sword/shield combo's and playing more of a tank style. so having more than one option for tanks would be amazing.
- Very excited over all. i think the basic attacks look amazing and carry the personalty of the class. But the entire game just looks fantastic, visuals in Unreal Engine 5 are stunning and the animations for the basic attacks are showing how much time and effort goes into making AoC.
Thank you for this month's update, it was very enjoyable and has me excited for future updates and ofcourse Alpha 2 and the Beta testing.
My one point of feedback is the dagger animations when attacking without a target (the wind/swoosh animation). In my opinion it looks kind of tacky and doesn't really fit within the other combat animations.
But to end positive; the game already brings A LOT of very good features I am looking for in a MMORPG.
Greetings from The Netherlands!
Boreales
The combat is to fast. -> if its a bit slower (like 15%) it would be way more reactive and impactful.
and maybe it would look better if the animations where a bitt smoother, like not that choppy and so you see the swing better.
On the negative side combat felt a bit too fast with both weapon especially the great sword. I felt the weapon effect where a bit too much, I would tune it down. I loved the weapon trail but with how intense the effect are it's very distracting and make it hard to see what's going on, I feal like it will get very busy with 5-10 players attacking and doing spell. I would prefer to have your character and the enemy react to being hit by subtle movement (no ministun or anything like that, just visual) and bring the weapon effect down a bit so we can see this better.
Weight and impact looks good with some weapons having more oomph but not too much to make it feel like it restrict movement too much.
It's really hard to give proper feedback without actually playing, i hope Alpha testers get to start testing combat soon so they can provide better feedback on the changes made and the overall direction combat is going.
Edit: looked at the footage in slow mo and noticed the animations have a brief stop but the effect still continues and that what feels off to me.
Quess it's there to make the hit feel more ''impactful'' imo the hit should continue with the effect.
Edit 2: Animations only had framestops when hitting mobs, also made a few edits to the greeatsword attacks cuz they seemed a little fast.
Would need to see how this interacts with ranged attacks, eg. bows AND spells to get a real feel for how final combat will feel. Obviously, a ranged player should be able to put distance between themselves and melee players to have an advantage to being ranged-- But if melee inherently lacks CC to counter this, are they meant to use gap closers? A conundrum of balance for a later date.
I liked the floating combat text a lot. Clear, concise communication of incoming and outgoing damage. Color customization is super important; Orange text might be harder to see in a full desert biome. Would be glad to change it.
As an addition, 'cause I'm not sure where else to give this feedback: I like to dye my boots black or other dark colors regardless of what color the rest of my armor is. Practically, the "2 dye channel" system that Steven described is going to impact player creativity in a very negative way. I would be okay with seeing rainbows walk down the street if it meant not having to base my character's entire appearance on how each and every piece of it receives the one, singular dye theme I am allowed to apply the entire set. Invariably, colors will apply differently to different pieces of armor, and suddenly I don't want to use the gloves I really like the appearance of, because the red I want on my chest piece looks horrible and muted on the gloves that I'd otherwise just make brown. Controlling what dye colors are available is a better avenue to avoiding clown suits, if that is the intended goal.
I think scale between heavy and light seems good, there is enough slow on heavy side.
Sword looks really fun and weighty animations look really good. Yellow light might be slightly too intrusive but not bad.
Daggers something felt bit off maybe looked more of dual swords. Didn't get feeling of backstabby weapon.
After effect of daggers is way too much in my opinion with high attack speed the after effect is only thing you really get to see.
Movement speed with daggers seems to be spot on. Looked bit floaty but with polish seems good.
Dash ability/dodge? ability looked great.