Melee Weapons - Roles And Revamps

[Ghobe]

Alright people, I think it's time we seriously think about our melee weapons.

 

Right now I see 4 sections that all melee weapons fall into: Single Sword, Dual Wield, Heavy, and Special. Now it's hard to touch on the Special section as every weapon in this section(glaive for example) will serve a unique purpose(ranged replacement). However, we can work with the other 3.

 

So right now...the majority of the weapons in these categories fall in like this...

 

Heavy: Hits Multiple Targets, Largest Range, Highest Damage, Knocks down on everything, has longest charge times, Stun Protection while swinging

Dual Wield: Hits Multiple Targets, Quick Charge Attacks, Raw Elemental Damage

Single Sword: Hits Single Target, Fastest Charge Speed

 

Now here's the problem, Dual wield and Single sword deal the same damage in most cases, Heavy deals roughly double the damage of the other two and has a multitude of advantages. Here's what I think it should probably change to...

 

Heavy: Hits multiple targets, largest range, highest damage, longest charge time, has multiple charge 'levels'(Immune to stun/knock when charge level great than 1, speed slowed by 30% per charge level, both movement and charge), extremely high stamina cost

Dual Wield Aoe(DWA): Hits Multiple Targets, Quick Charge Attack

Dual Wield Single(DWS): Hits Single Target, Regular Melee attacks hit multiple times

Single Sword Skilled(SSS): Hits Single Target, Damage Increased on successive melee hits without being hit, Melee Parrying causes enemy to stagger and take increased damage from next melee attack(does not reset successive hit counter,enemy sent to floor if hit with melee when staggered), Raw Elemental Damage

Single Sword Charged(SSC): Hits Single Target, Has multiple charge 'levels'(can only continue to charge beyond 1 while standing still, upon releasing melee button or moving, the attack is launched), Raw Elemental Damage

 

Now to tell you what this basically does. Heavy weapons are still the highest burst damage weapons in the game, but now they have competition. Dual wield takes the form of speed, which is kind of the reason most people dual wield in anything(other being a defensive tool that can be switched to offense). Single swords take on a new form that actually makes them useful. I see them mostly becoming the solo boss encounter go-to weapon(namely the SSS) for the skilled player. The SSC on the other hand will become the party boss weapon in most cases for a charge-style player while the DWS will be the go-to weapon for people that want to spam their melee button. We're allowing playstyles to be viable with these changes.

 

However, new mods will need to be released for these changes to have effect. Namely, for charge levels(Heavy and SSC), parry damage/duration(SSS), possibly even damage on additional hits(DWS).

 

I understand doing all this will require quite some work, but I believe it's the right direction to go. As long as damage vs speed is observed closely and balanced well, I can see this working very well.

 

Opinions from the community?

Edited June 20, 2013 by Ghobe

[fatpig84]

No need for major re-work for Dual wield and Heavy imo.

They are fine.

 

Current

DW = Cleave, fast, but no stagger immunity.

Heavy = Cleave, slow, but with stagger immunity.

Short / longsword = Single target, fast, fastest charge speed.

 

Proposed

Short / Longsword = Single target, very fast swing, fastest charge speed and stagger immune.

Edited June 20, 2013 by fatpig84