Melee forced movement.

[Scar.brother.help.me]

Since DE is doing some good job lately (revisiting old core stuff) I'd like to point the issue with forced movement during every combo in the game. Every combo has some degree of how strongly each combo takes control over frame's legs: on the lowest end some polearm and dual dagger stances and on the highest gunblade BULLET DANCE E+Block combo with jumping back and sides like some cartoon rabbit falling off the cliffs.

Any good change here is needed, whatever good DE can come up with, but here is my proposal:

E - melee
B - Block
F - forward

Now:
combo 1: E, E, E - slow or medium speed steps forward, some combo moves root you in place, some leap you forward
combo 2: E+F - usually a walking forward combo sometimes with dashing, some moves slow you down
combo 3: E+B - slow/medium steps forward, sometimes with 1-2 dashes forward, sometimes something different like slams, most versatile combos here
combo 4: E+B+F - dashes/leaps mixed with standing strikes
 All the movements are attached to weapon's attack speed, and the higher the attack speed the harder it is to control the warframe, it feels like a conflict between forced combo movement and parkour in game physics and probably is. Add to that requirement to hold forward for half combos gives even more restrictions to your movement. Melee feels like you try to control the tram that can only go forward while spamming melee like acceleration, it speeds up whenever it wants and randomly slows down - all you can do is try to move this tram by aiming on your enemy and don't miss, the only way to stop or step back is to stop hitting and press back. (in some cases a jumping back and sides tram)

Proposal:
First of all - remove any forced movement during melee, let warframes stand still while they perform melee combos and heavy attacks unless we want to move to ANY desired direction and use the movement button/stick ourselves.
Second - I propose to use crouch button as one of the combo buttons. We already use it a lot for the bullet jump and slide attacks, so it should be very easy to get used to it while using melee. 

E - melee
B - Block
C - crouch

combo 1: E, E - standing still or moving to any direction (can be a faster sprint speed like a running combo)
combo 2: E+B - standing still or moving to any direction (can be a medium walk speed but harder hitting combo)
combo 3: E+B+C - standing still or moving to any direction (can be a slow crouch-like speed combo either hitting very hard or forcing procs, slams, spin attacks)
combo 4: E+C - standing still or dashing/leaping/jumping to any direction (and slide attack is already a good gap closing move so it should feel the same way and work together)

This way melee will become much more responsive and true ninja-like. 

P.S:"DE, I appreciate all the job done with melee so far, it became much better. Melee 3.0 was worth waiting, but it needs just a little bit more 🤏."

 

 

Edited April 9, 2020 by Scar.brother.help.me
Changed topic name.

[Infirito]

  Misleading title is misleading. Really not a fan of "people's champions" who know exactly what EVERYONE thinks. I'm fine with melee combos as they are and I feel like adding crouch to combos will just mess it up with constant sliding around when you want to move, while if you lock sliding when you perform combos it would just remove our ability to reposition quickly. As of now, if you turn on melee attacks auto-targeting enemies (or whatever the option is called) you will stay in place while performing most combos regardless of how much movement they usually have, the only ones it doesn't work with are Block+Forward combos, but they are designed as instigators, so I really don't see a problem there.

What I think we need is more stances, some weapons only have 1 to begin with and now DE adds Stance Forma, what for? Most people I've talked to never change stances, and those that do swap them for stances with the same polarity already (2-handed swords, 1-handed swords, Nikanas).

 

But if you really hate the current system, here's a counter-offer: instead of using different input for different combos we would get an ability to swap combos in use with Alt Fire like we do with firing mods on something like Tiberon Prime. This would free input buttons and allow for removal of movement in combos (aside from instigators, their whole purpose is to move you around).

Alternatively, another switch in option. We have one for auto-targeting, new one would be for auto-movement.

[Aldain]

4 hours ago, Infirito said:

Really not a fan of "people's champions" who know exactly what EVERYONE thinks/wants.

Welcome to the modern world, don't worry, I hate it as much as you do.

[Teridax68]

While I'm not the biggest fan of more combos or adding more movement inputs to them, I do agree with the core proposal of removing forced movement to melee: that is something that should've been done in Melee 3.0, but instead of removing the forced movement, it feels like the devs only adjusted the movement in the forward+attack combos to roughly match our movement speed. It's the main reason why melee still feels wooden, I think, and allowing us free movement while meleeing should've been a priority. This is also why I want to completely disconnect our combos from movement as well: I don't think we should be moving awkwardly just for the sake of a particular melee combo, just as we typically don't need to do that in order to make our guns do their different things. It's also why I'd like to reduce or even remove our combos in favor of bespoke attacks per melee weapon, as most of our combos essentially just do the same thing: guns don't need a dozen different attack animations to differentiate themselves from each other, so why should we expect that from our melee weapons, especially when stances still cause melee weapons in the same class to play identically to each other?

[Tiltskillet]

Actually, I don't mind forced movement on some stances.  A good example for me is the claw stance Malicious Raptor.  At first I didn't like it at all compared to Vermilion Storm, which has very free movement in comparison.   But after sticking it with it for a while, I liked it more and more as I discovered how good at applying damage it is, and learned where its movements would put me and what targets it would hit.   So there's a skill there, which feels pretty good to me to be acquiring.  And I still return to Vermilion Storm when I want more open movement (and more AoE).

So that points to a larger issue, which is that many weapon classes don't have these kinds of interesting choices between stances.  Many only have one stance, and many that have more than one, still don't feature one with very free movement.   So I'd say, -every weapon class should feature at least one stance like that-.  Address that, and I don't think a drastic change in the stance concept is needed.

And on top of that of course, many stances don't offer any distinctive advantages or character of their own, many combos just feel broken and unfinished, and many stances don't even feature four different combos.  Which is all a huge let-down after the build up for the melee overhaul.  But in any case, all that still needs to be worked on.

Do all that, and I personally would be very happy with the system without removing forced movement from every combo.

[Scar.brother.help.me]

Is it so that most forum folks don't see this as a problem or at least an annoying feature? I would like to hear a feedback and have a discussion with Tenno who use melee a lot. Do you like the mechanic of your legs being tied to your melee combos and attack speed?

[Finn_Flannigan]

I'd be fine if we could just hold our 'backwards' key to stop from moving forward. If pressing no movement key forces us to move anyway, then that option would be available.

I love using melee. Being forced to move on certain combos feels natural, but on others it can make me move past my target (like an ancient healer in the midst of a crowd of infested). I forget which stance it was, but every combo moved me ahead so it felt rather detrimental in that case. Being able to backpedal to stop it seems like a viable option; at least for the combos you stand still for of course.

[Kainosh]

On 2020-04-08 at 9:41 AM, Scar.brother.help.me said:

First of all - remove any forced movement during melee

Meh.

IMO, only Gunblade stances have that movement problem.   

Any other stance, be it Blind Justice, Rending crane, Atlantis Vulcan or Shattering Storm, are perfectly fine. Their "Dash" moves are pretty useful.

 

If you have problems with SOME stances, don't mess around with ALL of them.

Just Create a list of Stances that have said problem, and point out exact Combos that have any awkward movement. 

[Scar.brother.help.me]

 

4 hours ago, Finn_Flannigan said:

I'd be fine if we could just hold our 'backwards' key to stop from moving forward. If pressing no movement key forces us to move anyway, then that option would be available.

I love using melee. Being forced to move on certain combos feels natural, but on others it can make me move past my target (like an ancient healer in the midst of a crowd of infested). I forget which stance it was, but every combo moved me ahead so it felt rather detrimental in that case. Being able to backpedal to stop it seems like a viable option; at least for the combos you stand still for of course.

I don't like the point of holding forward for combo, if I was able to rebind it to any other button like crouch or something I definitely would.  I want to press forward only if I want to get closer to the enemy, if I press back, I want to step back while continuing the same combo, if I press left or right I want to continue my combo and move to the desired direction just like with a gun. And if I don't touch any directional buttons it seems logical to let me be in place. My issue is that I want to control my character, not a train with just one acceleration pedal and a steering wheel.

Edited April 13, 2020 by Scar.brother.help.me

[Finn_Flannigan]

25 minutes ago, Scar.brother.help.me said:

 

I don't like the point of holding forward for combo, if I was able to rebind it to any other button like crouch or something I definitely would.  I want to press forward only if I want to get closer to the enemy, if I press back, I want to step back while continuing the same combo, if I press left or right I want to continue my combo and move to the desired direction just like with a gun. And if I don't touch any directional buttons it seems logical to let me be in place. My issue is that I want to control my character, not a train with just one acceleration pedal and a steering wheel.

I can't say it's an invalid opinion.

Personally I don't think I've ever had to move backwards while hacking away but I understand the want for control. Feels like the game is telling you what to do rather than you telling it what you want.