Animation canceling, Dodging, weaving

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Animation canceling is harmful to the fluidity of combat-gameplay, thus it should be minimized at the very least, if not removed entirely. The only "animation cancels" should be manually canceling channeled abilities through movement or manually canceling the channel with something like pressing Esc. Otherwise you should just be mindful of what abilities you are using and at what times you use them. Arguing animation cancels increase skill cap is a moot point if the gameplay looks like a pile of garbage.

Mag7spy

How is animation cancelling harmful to fluidity of combat?

Being stuck in every ability without being able to cancel or dodge out of it will make the game feel clunky, akin to new world. And that depends on the length of the animations. If they are short it won't be as bad. But the hammer one and spinning ability there is no reason to not be able to dodge roll out of that and have control of your character.

So you should only be able to stop tab target abilities during cast time???

Animation cancel does not make gameplay look like garbage just because you can roll out of the spin and cancel it early as an example. I don't see where you are getting this from, what exact part looks like garbage and why? The spin is the same besides it ending early and you are just doing your dodge, nothing about that is out of the ordinary?

234Graph

Mag7spy wrote: »

Skill ceiling and fluidly in combat is not a hassle. The same way you can break out of a cast time in tab target, is the same way you should be able to cancel animations into dodges at the bare minimum. Else movement for cast times should keep you still as well, which would be the opposite of being fluid.

The only reason not for animation cancelling is if you want people to be locked in animation, which in the end will feel more clunky if you don't have highs and lows of control with a character. Only reason is tab target players want an advantage against players that use action skills freely being able to cancel all their skills if cast times are involved.

In what way does animation cancelling add fluidity to combat? It just makes your skills n/ability trigger faster, speed ≠ fluidity. Having to live through like 0.2 seconds of the attack ending sequence is not going to kill you, nor does it somehow make combat clunkly. I'd argue that if someone needs animation cancelling to defeat their opponent, then said persons skill level really isn't that high in the first place.

Mag7spy

234Graph wrote: »

Mag7spy wrote: »

Skill ceiling and fluidly in combat is not a hassle. The same way you can break out of a cast time in tab target, is the same way you should be able to cancel animations into dodges at the bare minimum. Else movement for cast times should keep you still as well, which would be the opposite of being fluid.

The only reason not for animation cancelling is if you want people to be locked in animation, which in the end will feel more clunky if you don't have highs and lows of control with a character. Only reason is tab target players want an advantage against players that use action skills freely being able to cancel all their skills if cast times are involved.

In what way does animation cancelling add fluidity to combat? It just makes your skills trigger faster, speed ≠ fluidity. Having to live through like 0.2 seconds of the attack ending sequence is not going to kill you, nor does it somehow make combat clunkly. I'd argue that if you need animation cancelling to defeat your opponent, then said persons skill level really isn't that high in the first place

1. Animation cancel shouldn't be used to make your skills trigger faster, its either it does the dmg or it does not do the damage.
2. If you are doing a spinning attack where you are standing still for 1 minimum that is a lot of time in a pvp fight. Not having control of your character adds a clunky feel if you feel you are constantly rooted and never have an escape.
3. That isn't how skill level work, you don't get a higher skill level game by making it so a person has to sit still at all times. You have a higher level skill game when you have multiple choices when to use the dodge, when to bait someone , knowing when to hold your resources and when to spend them effectively. What you are saying is the opposite as you are trying to have more forced opening, on the player so they can't react.

JamesSunderland

I dont mind some skills being animation cancelable or being able to cancel the animation of other skills as long as it isn't universal throughout all skills but very limited.

Archeage had very few animation cancelable skills[like 1 per main skills tree(melee,archer and mage)] Mage's God's whip for example, it had a very small GCD and had "charges" so you could animation cancel with other skills between each of the charges usage basically negating the game's GCD and it became even more pronounced with high Attack Speed stats(Attack speed directly reduced gcd and increased animation speed of almost all skills).

Lineage 2 doesn't have GCD, and animation canceling there was more of an visual illusion than an actual thing, like in Archeage, Lineage 2 had stats that would influence the animation speed of skills, those being attack speed(for physical skills) and casting speed(for magic skills), above a certain threshold of those stats some skill animations would simple not keep up with the speed the skills would apply its damage and that + no GCD gave the impression of visually animation canceling.

Talking in general i don't think Ashes will have Animation cancels, but who knows, there might be a few deviant skills here and there that might allow such things, but other than that, Ashes in alpha 1 had Magical Casting Speed as a benefit of the Wisdom Stat https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Stats , who knows what possibilities this stat may create, i believe the faster you can push the animation speed of a skill the more it gives the illusion of animation canceling even if only by few frames..

falcorpix

234Graph wrote: »

Having to live through like 0.2 seconds of the attack ending sequence is not going to kill you.

No, it can definitely kill you.

234Graph

Mag7spy wrote: »

234Graph wrote: »

Mag7spy wrote: »

Skill ceiling and fluidly in combat is not a hassle. The same way you can break out of a cast time in tab target, is the same way you should be able to cancel animations into dodges at the bare minimum. Else movement for cast times should keep you still as well, which would be the opposite of being fluid.

The only reason not for animation cancelling is if you want people to be locked in animation, which in the end will feel more clunky if you don't have highs and lows of control with a character. Only reason is tab target players want an advantage against players that use action skills freely being able to cancel all their skills if cast times are involved.

In what way does animation cancelling add fluidity to combat? It just makes your skills trigger faster, speed ≠ fluidity. Having to live through like 0.2 seconds of the attack ending sequence is not going to kill you, nor does it somehow make combat clunkly. I'd argue that if you need animation cancelling to defeat your opponent, then said persons skill level really isn't that high in the first place

1. Animation cancel shouldn't be used to make your skills trigger faster, its either it does the dmg or it does not do the damage.
2. If you are doing a spinning attack where you are standing still for 1 minimum that is a lot of time in a pvp fight. Not having control of your character adds a clunky feel if you feel you are constantly rooted and never have an escape.
3. That isn't how skill level work, you don't get a higher skill level game by making it so a person has to sit still at all times. You have a higher level skill game when you have multiple choices when to use the dodge, when to bait someone , knowing when to hold your resources and when to spend them effectively. What you are saying is the opposite as you are trying to have more forced opening, on the player so they can't react.

1. I'm sorry but you're being overly dramatic if waiting half a second or less for your attack animation to finish equates to standing still, not having control over your character(when you're literally the one who performed the attack) and/or combat being clunky in pvp.

2. And once again I'd argue it doesn't bring any high skill ceiling at all, if you need to cancel your animation to dodge, block etc.. because you noticed your opponent one-uped you at that time then you're just running away; just learn to better read your opponent and make the appropriate decisions next time. You do homeever have a point with baiting as it can help there.

3. All in all AC just seems to benefit people with much higher reaction reaction time rather than skill.

Tryol

Mag7spy wrote: »

So you should only be able to stop tab target abilities during cast time???

Animation cancel does not make gameplay look like garbage just because you can roll out of the spin and cancel it early as an example. I don't see where you are getting this from, what exact part looks like garbage and why? The spin is the same besides it ending early and you are just doing your dodge, nothing about that is out of the ordinary?

What you just described here is NOT animation cancelling.
This is often referred to action/skill cancelling and will almost certainly be part of the game as far as I know.

Animation cancelling is when you stop a skill's animation after its effect has been applied, even though its animation didn't end yet. This would allow you to execute multiple actions in a shorter time than you are "normally" supposed to.

As long as the effect of the skill doesn't register, you are NOT animation cancelling, you are cancelling the skill/action itself.

Anonymous332

No AC please

Selo

Noone wants that shit
In the dev discussion an overwhelming majority said they dont want animation canceling or weaving

Azherae

Spellcasters have been able to move and cast certain abilities since the beginning. Moving did not immediately cancel any ability I could think of in Alpha-1 on Cleric. There were some where I could not move once it started, but if I could, it did not cancel anything.

Dodging and weaving can refer only to being able to move while casting or swinging, which is what we were shown. It does not imply any animation canceling is possible. I say this just to offer the other perspective. As MOBA/Fighting Game player, I have no reason to interpret those terms to mean 'using evasion abilities' far less animation cancels.

I don't care either way, but at the moment we can't claim it is contradictory.

Mag7spy

Hmm well if its only to speed attacks up so you can spam them faster ya I agree against that. Guess my interpretation is different its not something that is just limited to dodging and you can use attacks to cancel / stop other animations and that attack doesn't go off or deal dmg.

Mag7spy

If you can dodge / parry mid animation , that is good enough for me.

Mag7spy

Otr wrote: »

Mag7spy wrote: »

If you can dodge / parry mid animation , that is good enough for me.

Then you should edit out from the thread title the "Animation canceling" expression.

Title as dodging and weaving as well, kept it together since someone mentioned it in another threat. And you are still technically cancelling a animation, the point is if you don't do systems properly you can get damage off if what people are worried about.

Dolyem

Mag7spy wrote: »

How is animation cancelling harmful to fluidity of combat?

Being stuck in every ability without being able to cancel or dodge out of it will make the game feel clunky, akin to new world. And that depends on the length of the animations. If they are short it won't be as bad. But the hammer one and spinning ability there is no reason to not be able to dodge roll out of that and have control of your character.

So you should only be able to stop tab target abilities during cast time???

Animation cancel does not make gameplay look like garbage just because you can roll out of the spin and cancel it early as an example. I don't see where you are getting this from, what exact part looks like garbage and why? The spin is the same besides it ending early and you are just doing your dodge, nothing about that is out of the ordinary?

Bad ability design does not mean you should use another bad form of gameplay to remedy it. Ability animation locks should only be reserved for particularly powerful abilities, and in their own way they are a channel. As stated by another in this thread, ability canceling is stopping animations to gain lost time by utilizing the affect of an ability but shortening it by canceling the animation. That being said, some abilities will make complete sense to be able to roll out of/dodge while in the middle of an action, others should have more of a commitment so people are wary of using them at the wrong moment even though they may be a powerful option, risk vs reward. Animation locking is neither good nor bad, it simply needs to be utilized properly. True animation canceling in its own right is exploiting the combats design. The dodge/roll mid-action you want is entirely plausible, but there should be exceptions based on ability designs, and a focus on making sure the abilities dodged out of performing don't have the intended effect once canceled. And to maintain fluidity I would maybe require a sort of manual cancel of an ability prior to the roll. that way you aren't seeing people doing a blurred whirlwind one second and then instantly they fly off the screen in a roll lmao.

Mag7spy

Dolyem wrote: »

Mag7spy wrote: »

How is animation cancelling harmful to fluidity of combat?

Being stuck in every ability without being able to cancel or dodge out of it will make the game feel clunky, akin to new world. And that depends on the length of the animations. If they are short it won't be as bad. But the hammer one and spinning ability there is no reason to not be able to dodge roll out of that and have control of your character.

So you should only be able to stop tab target abilities during cast time???

Animation cancel does not make gameplay look like garbage just because you can roll out of the spin and cancel it early as an example. I don't see where you are getting this from, what exact part looks like garbage and why? The spin is the same besides it ending early and you are just doing your dodge, nothing about that is out of the ordinary?

Bad ability design does not mean you should use another bad form of gameplay to remedy it. Ability animation locks should only be reserved for particularly powerful abilities, and in their own way they are a channel. As stated by another in this thread, ability canceling is stopping animations to gain lost time by utilizing the affect of an ability but shortening it by canceling the animation. That being said, some abilities will make complete sense to be able to roll out of/dodge while in the middle of an action, others should have more of a commitment so people are wary of using them at the wrong moment even though they may be a powerful option, risk vs reward. Animation locking is neither good nor bad, it simply needs to be utilized properly. True animation canceling in its own right is exploiting the combats design. The dodge/roll mid-action you want is entirely plausible, but there should be exceptions based on ability designs, and a focus on making sure the abilities dodged out of performing don't have the intended effect once canceled. And to maintain fluidity I would maybe require a sort of manual cancel of an ability prior to the roll. that way you aren't seeing people doing a blurred whirlwind one second and then instantly they fly off the screen in a roll lmao.

If you are manually cancelling a skill before a roll that is when you get janky broken animation cancelling and clunky gameplay. You are purposely making it more confusing then it needs to be when it should be simple. If you roll it cancels your animation if you haven't hit it stops and you can evade an attack.

Risk vrs reward is not taken away because you can dodge roll in a animation or parry if they added that with a skill. If you can only roll for a i frame every 7 seconds or so then its on CD. Its not making you dodge anymore then you already are.

Nothing wrong rolling out of WW that holds you in place and using your dodge putting it on cd.

Mag7spy

Otr wrote: »

Mag7spy wrote: »

Otr wrote: »

Mag7spy wrote: »

If you can dodge / parry mid animation , that is good enough for me.

Then you should edit out from the thread title the "Animation canceling" expression.

Title as dodging and weaving as well, kept it together since someone mentioned it in another threat. And you are still technically cancelling a animation, the point is if you don't do systems properly you can get damage off if what people are worried about.

What does mean "you can get damage off"?

I see they are worried that the game will look bad if the animation canceling is used.
Another worry might be what you mentioned before:

Mag7spy wrote: »

The only reason not for animation cancelling is if you want people to be locked in animation, which in the end will feel more clunky if you don't have highs and lows of control with a character. Only reason is tab target players want an advantage against players that use action skills freely being able to cancel all their skills if cast times are involved.

What does mean "highs and lows of control with a character"?

While Steven tries to sell this new style of combat, I think his comments apply to exactly this style, melee vs melee.

Maybe some spells will lock down the spell-caster but if the spell triggers, it will cause quite a big damage compared to other spells which allow movement.
If such a spell will ever be useful in one vs one PvP fight, melee vs spell caster, depends on how things are balanced, what resistances against magic the melee fighter has, how much health the caster have...

How does a game look bad because you can roll and stop in your skill or parry that makes no sense to me. Explain what looks bad exactly, felt like this is being made up or misunderstood.

When I'm talking about high and low I'm talking about the feel and flow of combat. There should be high points where you have your movement and lower points where you have reduced movement. Its helps to balance and great a good feel and flow of combat. Ie you shouldn't be able to spam a dodge every 2 seconds that is a iframe else you would just be locked in a more high aspect moment of speed. The same way it shouldn't be a iframe dodge every 30 seconds. You balance out high points of mobility so they feel impactful but you have to be careful not to have that happening every second else it becomes a mess.

I don't believe in locking down without being able to use your dodge, there should always be an escape option. Because people would just be like ok play careful and wait for him to use this skill and then teleport and blow him up the best you can. You need to be able to allow people to react and cancel animations. Imagine you used a tab skill and you had to stand still, it feel clunky. That is not saying all action combat active abilities will hold you still but we have seen two that does and you should be able to roll out of it. The spin one at any more before uppercut, and the hammer one at any point before the hammer does dmg.

There is no reason again to say you can't use dodge to get out of a animation. If you are trying to look at it as good then i can deal damage to them and take advantage of it that is the wrong mind set as you will have access tot these skills as well. If you are like I'm tab target so i won't have to worry and I'm fine, then you are trying to have action combat be clunky because you don't want it in the game. During testing depending on how we see more of these skills and when people see and start to play if there is a lot of animation lock without really good movement people will comment on it. And I'm confident it will be looked at like we need to give people some way so they don't feel stuck using these animations and unable to react for ones that hold you in place.

Dolyem

Mag7spy wrote: »

Dolyem wrote: »

Mag7spy wrote: »

How is animation cancelling harmful to fluidity of combat?

Being stuck in every ability without being able to cancel or dodge out of it will make the game feel clunky, akin to new world. And that depends on the length of the animations. If they are short it won't be as bad. But the hammer one and spinning ability there is no reason to not be able to dodge roll out of that and have control of your character.

So you should only be able to stop tab target abilities during cast time???

Animation cancel does not make gameplay look like garbage just because you can roll out of the spin and cancel it early as an example. I don't see where you are getting this from, what exact part looks like garbage and why? The spin is the same besides it ending early and you are just doing your dodge, nothing about that is out of the ordinary?

Bad ability design does not mean you should use another bad form of gameplay to remedy it. Ability animation locks should only be reserved for particularly powerful abilities, and in their own way they are a channel. As stated by another in this thread, ability canceling is stopping animations to gain lost time by utilizing the affect of an ability but shortening it by canceling the animation. That being said, some abilities will make complete sense to be able to roll out of/dodge while in the middle of an action, others should have more of a commitment so people are wary of using them at the wrong moment even though they may be a powerful option, risk vs reward. Animation locking is neither good nor bad, it simply needs to be utilized properly. True animation canceling in its own right is exploiting the combats design. The dodge/roll mid-action you want is entirely plausible, but there should be exceptions based on ability designs, and a focus on making sure the abilities dodged out of performing don't have the intended effect once canceled. And to maintain fluidity I would maybe require a sort of manual cancel of an ability prior to the roll. that way you aren't seeing people doing a blurred whirlwind one second and then instantly they fly off the screen in a roll lmao.

If you are manually cancelling a skill before a roll that is when you get janky broken animation cancelling and clunky gameplay. You are purposely making it more confusing then it needs to be when it should be simple. If you roll it cancels your animation if you haven't hit it stops and you can evade an attack.

Risk vrs reward is not taken away because you can dodge roll in a animation or parry if they added that with a skill. If you can only roll for a i frame every 7 seconds or so then its on CD. Its not making you dodge anymore then you already are.

Nothing wrong rolling out of WW that holds you in place and using your dodge putting it on cd.

If what I am proposing is clunky, yours would be an extremely floaty proposal. My manual cancel suggestion would just make it look better, sure its not the fastest possible gameplay, but that doesn't mean it will be clunky, its meant to be a fluid transition instead of something instantaneous. It looks better than every person on the screen flailing and rolling around mid-attack and just not looking in any way organic. Go outside and swing a sledgehammer like you're trying to cause some real damage and then try to either stop it mid swing or roll away mid swing. I am thinking you're going to hurt yourself or at the very least, you'll have to over correct in an inefficient way.
As far as keeping the gameplay fun while remaining fluid, this is honestly where making basic attacks tab targeting helps a lot. Leaving the big action abilities to being able to be canceled or not, purely based on how each ability works. Not all should be locked in, but not all should be able to be instantly rolled out of on a whim. Your choice to use the ability knowing there is a lock on the animation is a calculation and can even be argued as a skill cap when knowing how and when to use that ability or go against it. And if an ability is designed in a way that would require someone to over-exert themselves or go off-balance to attain more power, that should sacrifice ones mobility.

Mag7spy

Dolyem wrote: »

Mag7spy wrote: »

Dolyem wrote: »

Mag7spy wrote: »

How is animation cancelling harmful to fluidity of combat?

Being stuck in every ability without being able to cancel or dodge out of it will make the game feel clunky, akin to new world. And that depends on the length of the animations. If they are short it won't be as bad. But the hammer one and spinning ability there is no reason to not be able to dodge roll out of that and have control of your character.

So you should only be able to stop tab target abilities during cast time???

Animation cancel does not make gameplay look like garbage just because you can roll out of the spin and cancel it early as an example. I don't see where you are getting this from, what exact part looks like garbage and why? The spin is the same besides it ending early and you are just doing your dodge, nothing about that is out of the ordinary?

Bad ability design does not mean you should use another bad form of gameplay to remedy it. Ability animation locks should only be reserved for particularly powerful abilities, and in their own way they are a channel. As stated by another in this thread, ability canceling is stopping animations to gain lost time by utilizing the affect of an ability but shortening it by canceling the animation. That being said, some abilities will make complete sense to be able to roll out of/dodge while in the middle of an action, others should have more of a commitment so people are wary of using them at the wrong moment even though they may be a powerful option, risk vs reward. Animation locking is neither good nor bad, it simply needs to be utilized properly. True animation canceling in its own right is exploiting the combats design. The dodge/roll mid-action you want is entirely plausible, but there should be exceptions based on ability designs, and a focus on making sure the abilities dodged out of performing don't have the intended effect once canceled. And to maintain fluidity I would maybe require a sort of manual cancel of an ability prior to the roll. that way you aren't seeing people doing a blurred whirlwind one second and then instantly they fly off the screen in a roll lmao.

If you are manually cancelling a skill before a roll that is when you get janky broken animation cancelling and clunky gameplay. You are purposely making it more confusing then it needs to be when it should be simple. If you roll it cancels your animation if you haven't hit it stops and you can evade an attack.

Risk vrs reward is not taken away because you can dodge roll in a animation or parry if they added that with a skill. If you can only roll for a i frame every 7 seconds or so then its on CD. Its not making you dodge anymore then you already are.

Nothing wrong rolling out of WW that holds you in place and using your dodge putting it on cd.

If what I am proposing is clunky, yours would be an extremely floaty proposal. My manual cancel suggestion would just make it look better, sure its not the fastest possible gameplay, but that doesn't mean it will be clunky, its meant to be a fluid transition instead of something instantaneous. It looks better than every person on the screen flailing and rolling around mid-attack and just not looking in any way organic. Go outside and swing a sledgehammer like you're trying to cause some real damage and then try to either stop it mid swing or roll away mid swing. I am thinking you're going to hurt yourself or at the very least, you'll have to over correct in an inefficient way.
As far as keeping the gameplay fun while remaining fluid, this is honestly where making basic attacks tab targeting helps a lot. Leaving the big action abilities to being able to be canceled or not, purely based on how each ability works. Not all should be locked in, but not all should be able to be instantly rolled out of on a whim. Your choice to use the ability knowing there is a lock on the animation is a calculation and can even be argued as a skill cap when knowing how and when to use that ability or go against it. And if an ability is designed in a way that would require someone to over-exert themselves or go off-balance to attain more power, that should sacrifice ones mobility.

We can't start using real world examples that isn't what decides if something is floaty or not. You aren't rolling with a giant sword either so it doesn't really change anything on what is floaty. If you are mid swing and in the air no you shouldn't be able to dodge by that point int he animation. I think you are misunderstanding what makes something floaty, as long as they have good animation / transition and make sure it feels fluid it would be fine.

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