Melee combat - which game do you think does it best?

[rickyriot 1009]

...and which game, if any, should DayZ "lean" towards? These are two different questions although the answers could be the same. I will not create a poll as there are too many games with melee combat to list them here.

--[ quick head's up, this is a long post, the TL;DR is basically the title and the line above ]--

Ok, first off, just what am I referring to and secondly what has spurred me on to pose this question?

When I think back to all the DayZ incarnations there have been, from the mod to the original SA release to all the different iterations to where we are now the one thing that is surprising is that, for a zombie survival game, the zombie fighting is probably one of the weakest elements. We all sort of know why this is, DayZ came from Arma which in turn is far better at handling firearms than it is melee weapons. Don't get me wrong, the idea of wading through zombies with a blood stained axe was one of the most enjoyable things going when I first started playing DayZ. Remember the website had that counter at the top to indicate how many people were dying? It was some time ago, but I'm sure a few will remember that. It just highlighted what a dangerous place Cherno was.

Thing is, we accepted it as it was because we knew the basis of the mod (Arma) and that it was really the only thing around that had that sort of cross over open world survival/pvp/military gameplay. Fast forward to the recent release of the 63 and fighting the zombies is still not that convincing. Sure, that "realism" is a difficult thing to achieve, and the devs have made progress (to an extent) regarding that. and yes people will say "but it's still in development", and yes you would be right, but for me it's still not overly convincing.

This brings us to my first question: Which game does melee combat the best?

Now for my second question, taking into consideration your answer to the question above, should DayZ lean towards that game? Or is there another that you feel it should aim towards. Now we have to accept that certain melee implementations are not going to be viable. Say for example you said "Far Cry" and some of the fluidity of FC5 when taking down enemies is very enjoyable - a lot of it is scripted and involves upgrading a skill tree in order to achieve all the "takedown" tricks - but enjoyable it is. Now while fun, is not going to work in DayZ. It's not the same "environmental feel" of the character, FC always feels like it's characters are "living on top" of the open world it has, rather than "living in" and tend to be more flashy than practical. That might be a personal thing but I think most will accept that FC melee mechanics are not the way forward. However games like SCUM (just for example - which is equally in it's own development cycle) is comparable to DayZ. Again this is a personal thing but I feel you are part of the environment and the zombies feel part of the environment. For me, this thread was half inspired by playing SCUM recently and while I am not comparing like for like here, I found the melee combat intuitive, predictable and more importantly believable. The "zombies" have a weight, they are knocked back and while the current system they use is pretty basic and the AI attacks all to easy to get around, it is (imo) more enjoyable than going hand to hand with a zombie in DayZ. I should point out I am not saying SCUM is a better game, just commenting on this particular element. Don't get me wrong, it's not perfect, there are still things wrong with the it handles melee.

So, why this slightly lengthy post? Because I believe that melee should be one of the grounding elements of the game. Sure, the idea of zeroing in on a squad camping a hillside with a sniper rifle is fun. Laying down some "spray and pray" after being unexpectedly caught in the back streets of Cherno is as enjoyable as it is frantic, but the bread and butter of DayZ and especially for newbies and fresh spawns it will be the underlying core mechanic for the first hour at least of each new character. I want to be able to creep into a village armed only with an axe (or machete - the OP b*stard that it is right now!) and, when spotted, be able to go toe-to-toe with zombies and be confident in not just my movements but theirs too. I want to "feel" the weight of the weapon and "feel" the weight of the enemy it hits. The zombies should react in a "realistic manner". Certainly DayZ is getting closer to that than it has before but it's still, for me, not close enough to be "enjoyable".

Anyway, apologies if this has been a little rambling. I'd be interesting to what people's opinions are.

Edited September 16, 2018 by rickyriot

[Vattenlarv 81]

I am not much of a melee combat game player. I have only played a few, and one in particular more than the others. The reason as to why this one game is always installed in my Steam library, and I regularly boot it up for a quick session of intense action and severed limbs, is the melee combat system. You killing another player, or getting killed, always feel justified. If you get killed, your skills were outmatched by the other player breaking down your defense, and successfully defending against your offence. The way melee combat should be. 

The game is Chivalry Medieval Warfare. The basics of combat are clear and simple. To block an attack, you must look directly at the tip of the attacker's weapon, and time your block. And then you have a variety of attacks at your disposal. You can only block weapon attacks with other weapons or a shield, and block fists with your forearms. If melee combat in DayZ was similar to Chivalry, but simplified with less attacks and not as many special attacks for different weapons etc (as it would naturally be since Chivalry is a game focused primarily on this very system), then oooh geezus!! I would like to see it much slower than in Chivalry (Chivalry Medievel Warfare is like the Counter-Strike of melee combat) but then again; I want to see DayZ overall gameplay generally slower.

Edit; Sidenote. I hope BI adds an item with which you can melee fight with little to no damage taken or given when hitting your opponent, so players can practice melee combat in game. 

Another edit; Maybe the broom is that item already?!

Edited September 16, 2018 by Vattenlarv

[Max Planck 7174]

I  think the melee system kind of hinges on the amount of zeds that will be in the final game. If it stays a relatively low number, I think melee should be harder than in, say, Far Cry or Dying Light.

I think I would like to see something similar to Mount&Blade, if at all possible. Easy to understand, hard to master. Less circle strafing or the 'back and forth dance', more timed blocks and dissimilar weaponry.

[cirkular 178]

Controlled directional attacks so something like Mount & Blade.

[gorvi 189]

Modded skyrim for me.  DayZ has the potential to be one of the best melee survival games but devs need to make sure directional attacks or some other system offers a rock, paper, scissors scenario

[emuthreat 2837]

Rock paper scissors?  Respectively; sledgehammer, shovel, axe?

[gorvi 189]

1 hour ago, emuthreat said:

Rock paper scissors?  Respectively; sledgehammer, shovel, axe?

Quick attacks are good against moving or sidestepping players but weak against blocking.  Power attacks are good against blocking but poor against moving players.

When it comes to directional attacks I would only like to see left or right swings take advantage of getting around a blocking player or kicking while blocking.

Edited September 29, 2018 by gorvi

[emuthreat 2837]

1 hour ago, gorvi said:

Quick attacks are good against moving or sidestepping players but weak against blocking.  Power attacks are good against blocking but poor against moving players.

When it comes to directional attacks I would only like to see left or right swings take advantage of getting around a blocking player or kicking while blocking.

How would you propose the control scheme to allow this would look?  Q E for direction of swing, and shift for slow strong swings?

[Grimey Rick 3417]

GORN! ;)

Nah, Skyrim-ish combat would be a welcome addition. Perhaps a little more intuitive, though.

Edited September 30, 2018 by Grimey Rick

[gorvi 189]

11 hours ago, emuthreat said:

How would you propose the control scheme to allow this would look?  Q E for direction of swing, and shift for slow strong swings?

Pretty much this.  I'd use sidestep for the directional swing which can leave the attacking player exposed on the other side and momentarily prevent blocking.

[cirkular 178]

Skyrim melee mods are great too :)

 I hope this is the last time I will mention Mount & Blade :D for me this is the best melee system ever made for a game, in terms of amount of player control. Especially since it's a melee oriented game, I really don't know how much went into developing of the system. Plus, the game calculates the speed of the swing and the weapon damage/weight to make the final damage sum. On top of that, if you ride a horse, or hit someone riding/sprinting at you, you bet it will be even more powerful stab/bash. It's a great both single player and multi player RP and action game, although 10 years old now. I can't wait for the next one to be released :) Who hasn't tried it, I recommend to try out the demo still available on Steam.

So, in Mount & blade, there is a couple of ways you can control the direction of your attack. You can use the movement keys for that, or you can use the mouse. This way with the mouse is the best IMO, since the direction of your attack is completely independent of your movement with the keys. You'd just slightly move your mouse to left or right and then left click immediately to swing from those sides. The same goes for up (bash on the head from above) and down (stab like with a spear or a sword). You can also just hold the left mouse button to keep this stance while coming towards the opponent so you can time the attack properly. But you can change the side of attack in the middle of the move with a trick. It's the same for one handed and two handed weapons. Also, like invert mouse for looking around, you can invert all those directions for mouse control if you want. It's completely customizable in the options.

Now the hardest part comes with blocking, which is right click. You can use auto-block which makes the character himself block the attack wherever it is coming from. But it proves to be ineffective when someone uses this trick I wrote about to quickly change the direction of the attack. So if you choose to control it manually, then for blocking goes the same as with attack direction control. Basically it's all about dragging the mouse and clicking to control your attacks/blocks. It's might be a hard and complex system to understand when speaking about it, but so easy and intuitive when get used to.

TLDR For Dayz, my controls are hold space for raise weapon, right click to toggle ADS on or off, CTRL for hold breath and walk. Right now, the system is incomplete, but I like the raise weapon + step back for block, and Q and E for sidestep dodge.

For melee, similar to M&B, my favorable option would be to hold raise weapon button/key and move the mouse slightly for direction of attack, hold breath button for direction of a block. Q and E for quick sidestepping when weapon is raised.

Of course the game is probably too complex already for all this, but the easier solution would be to at least use the movement keys for direction of attack and auto-block like it is now, or maybe when holding your breath.

 

[libertine 351]

Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay had the best hand to hand combat i've ever used. It just felt awesome. For using long objects like swords, Dark Messiah of Might and Magic and Chivalry: Medieval Warfare were the most complex. Never tried Mount and Blade.

Edited October 5, 2018 by libertine

[pilgrim* 3514]

On 9/29/2018 at 11:09 PM, emuthreat said:

Rock paper scissors?  Respectively; sledgehammer, shovel, axe?

Pokemon Red on Gameboy  

Edited October 5, 2018 by pilgrim*
awesome

[Waldemard 6]

Yeah Mount and Blade is still the best for me or maybe Kingdom come but its but only for single targets...

[Lorax 99]

I'll throw my 2 beans in and ride the mount and blade train. Though I don't know anything about programming, it seems the mount and blade style would work with then engine dayz is using. Kingdom come is great, but it just won't work