Core mechanics must cancel attacks

Core mechanics such as Dodge, sprint, jump, block should all cancel attacks or else you create a rooted animation clunkiness which will force players to avoid using those mechanics in favor of other mechanics. Example being block vs dodge for dealing with attacks. Dodge will stop any ongoing attack and break me free of ongoing animations which is critical for reaction time and counterplay....... On the other hand block does not do this. Both are time sensitive counterplay mechanics, but in most instances you wont be able to reliably block in time.

My main point is that players will complain about clunkiness whenever they feel slowed down by the game. The player should never feel like they are piloting a dumb robot that cant move or react as fast as them mentally. For example, I start attacking, but cannot stop my attack as an enemy player throws something at me which needs to be blocked. Mentally I see the telegraph and have the reaction time to do something...... but I am helplessly stuck as my dumb robot character slowly swings their sword.

The counter argument is: Your actions have consequences. If you lock yourself in an animation, you should not be able to get out. IMO this is flawed since game design wise you will isolate out any long cast time playstyles or potential skill designs. If players cannot stop and react to the action combat with long cast skills, they will simply only play with short cast time skills.

Also to the same argument, the action already had a consequence. You are canceling an attack that you paid for with wasted resources, stam, time, cooldown, etc just to have no damage output.

What are your thoughts? Which core mechanics should cancel attacks and stop rooted animations?

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Comments

MilosAoC

Block should function as a cancel cast button 100%. PLEASE add this intrepid.

Block already cancels certain (bard) abilities, but not all. I dont see a reason why it shouldnt double as a cancel cast button

MincVinyl

MilosAoC wrote: »

Block should function as a cancel cast button 100%. PLEASE add this intrepid.

Block already cancels certain (bard) abilities, but not all. I dont see a reason why it shouldn't double as a cancel cast button

Ahh I only got time time play fighter for a few hours this weekend. If it is cancelling some abilities than maybe this should be reported as a bug. Perhaps they just messed up their state engines and it is supposed to cancel casts and attacks.

Anyone else know of other instances where block cancels or doesn't cancel attacks? I will try to put together a list if others want to contribute.

Nval1d

Great read , valid points

MincVinyl

Just a heads up, I had checked light attacks and most of the fighter skills and block now cancels and stops animations/attacks.

This can go either way, but what is nice is that if you cancel an attack, no damage goes out. This promotes well timed inputs for maximum burst. Compared to a game like ESO where it is all about constantly animation canceling skills by overlapping inputs.

The current system of stopping attacks and promoting timing inputs allows combat to be more transparent for counterplay. Instead of having multiple animations overlapped where an important skill may be hidden by an overly flamboyant animation.

I suggest players test canceling attacks in the following ways. Please report back if you find inconsistencies.

block cancel
Roll cancel
Jump
Other skills
falling
get stunned

wakkytabbaky

100% block needs to animation cancel anything you are doing.
try being a tank and then getting smacked harder all because your character was mid swing of his swords autoattack and then block wouldnt activate. you either have to manually auto attack or simply stand there with block up looking stupid for a extra second or two.

us poor oce tanks already have 150-200ms latency making timing harder let alone having to deal with animations cucking us as well

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