Advanced Melee Stances System & Improved Combat Movement

[-.Vergil.-]

Yo!

I'm Peter aka -DEVIL-WARRIOR- and I'm a PC player. I'm a player, which love melee combat and it was basically my first point (or goal) in the game. In this thread I want to share with a really great idea, which is Advanced Melee Stances System (AMSS). I will try to show how exacly this idea looks like and why it's better than actual Melee Stance System.

--------------------------------------------------

First of all I'll say something about actual Stances System. It's kind of weird in my opinion, 'cause they are like mods. Let's be serious, grab a mod and become a master (at least this is how it looks like now), while Warframe is more grind like game based on players experience (am I right?). At this point I feel like player experience isn't important. Why didn't change that to be more grind like? For sure this would change a lot, but I hope in a much more better way. Also this will bring to Warframe a lot of new stuffs to grind, trade and probably for many players it's gonna improve their own play style.
 

Quote

"Grab a Sword and became a Master":
MASTER NEWBIE! [MR 1]
Sword with Crimson Dervish
...Are you serious?...

--------------------------------------------------

Now let's talk more about AMSS. As we know, we have a lot of melee weapon types: Swords, Heavy Blades, Polearms, Dual Swords, Daggers, Hammers, Gunblades, Scythes, Blades and Whips, Swords and Shields, Glaives, Tonfas, Staffs, Nikanas, Claws, Rapiers, Dual Daggers, Whips, Fists, Machetes and Nunchakus. Most of them have more than one stance, but you can't combine them together and you can "learn" them only by having a mod on a melee. AMSS is based on players combat experience with one of the melee weapon types. With each melee killed enemy players will gain a Combat Experience, which will allow to unlock new, better attacks animations (combos). For example, when you're using Sword you'll gain Combat Experience only for Sword attacks. When players unlock some new attacks they will can combine them and create their own Combat Stances. There's only one rule - it can't be the same attack in each slot. That's not all. Players will be able to name and save those stances and even to share with other players (like songs). However players without unlocked specific attacks will be not allowed to use them (even if they just don't have one of the attacks).
 

Quote

1) Gain Combat Experience (CEXP) by Killing Enemies.
2) Unlock New Attacks by Collecting CEXP.
3) Create Own Stance by selecting Attacks to each Combat Slot.

--------------------------------------------------

Few words about Combo Slots. There's gonna be a few slots - from 1 (Basic) to 5 (Advanced) or even more (based on MR). I have here two ideas:
1) Multiple Combos
Each Combo will be performed in different combination (which may be hard to create). For example, you can perform combo like this: 1, 5, 2, 4, 5 | 5, 2, 2 PAUSE, 4, 3, etc. (like you want, 'till you know how to perform them - something like now).
2) Perfect Combo
Each Combo will be performed after each one in the Combo Chain (in my opinion it's a better choice). For example, you can perform combo like this: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 | 1, 2, 3, PAUSE, 1, 2, etc. (in order, but still have to know how to perform them to create a Perfect Combo. Also pause will stop the Combo Chain).
 

Quote

Example of Own Stance:
1 - [Combat Slot 1] - Class of Attack 1 (Basic Attacks)
2 - [Combat Slot 2] - Class of Attack 2 (Better Attacks)
3 - [Combat Slot 3] - Class of Attack 2 & 3 (Improved Attacks)
4 - [Combat Slot 4] - Class of Attack 3 & 4 (Advanced Attacks)
5 - [Combat Slot 5] - Class of Attack 4 & 5 (Ultimate Attacks)
...

Perfect Combo Chain (without pause);
[Combat Slot 1] -> [Combat Slot 2] -> [Combat Slot 3] -> [Combat Slot 4] -> [Combat Slot 5] (Perfect Combo)

--------------------------------------------------

Now probably some of you will start thinking about Melee Weapon Stance Slots and actual Stance Mods. I also have a good solution here. Those Mods will became a Buffs for specific attacks. For example, Blind Justice (Nikana) will give a player Buff to Guiding Light attack (for example: extra range, speed and damage only for this attack - all upgradable by Endo like now). This will keep our actual extra slots for our melee builds untouched and also bring some new mods into the game.
 

Quote

Stance Mods -> Attack Buff Mods

--------------------------------------------------

And last (but not worse) idea - Improved Combat Movement, which is just a cosmetic idea. Just add Dash (fast standing movement like Limbo is doing it) against those rolls. It's quite simple change, however in my opinion it will look much more better than rolling around for such dynamic game.
 

Quote

Dash:
W/A/S/D + Double Tap Sprint
Flip:
W/A/S/D + Hold Aim/Block + Double Tap Sprint

--------------------------------------------------

And I guess that's all I've wanted to post here. Hope you're gonna like it! :)

[13QZXXTTX]

First of, you sure are BOLD. .

o.o Yes maybe DE should consider polishing up the Melee System when possible. WarFrame's has enough space for improvement for Melees.

Still this is like Dual-Melees? So it going to take time. DE has to finish up with Dual-Wield.

 

Can I ask of any Games Tittle that you could have got the Resemble Idea from? Maybe Old School (original Adventure Game?) or BIG FAN of Melee Duel Game?

PS: NOT EVERYTHING going to be guaranteed as thought of. If everything would have been possible, this would have been Standard (for Sword) in most Game. I can see why, the MELEE System is a BIT TOO MUCH, o.o We need more thoughts on it. Good Luck!

[InDueTime-EN-]

First of, I would like a better melee system, preferably something close to DMC, but since they are still pushing out new stances for this current system, I doubt that there would be any major changes to it.

I have a question though. In your mind, which keys are these "Combat slots" bound to?

[-.Vergil.-]

@DesFrSpace
Haha, actually I'm just a creative guy. It's 100% original idea (or at least I don't know any single game with such system). Maybe Devil May Cry franchise, but still it's not exacly the same system. It's all just based on logic and my experience as gamer. It's also a lil bit my old habit, when I was helping with running, giving ideas and creating maps for GTA San Andreas Servers few years ago. :P

But I agree that melee system need some improvements. Dual Swords are not the only problem. Also Wall Attacks aren't scaled with actual melee attack speed (and I've noticed that already). :)

@InDueTime-EN-
It would be great to see some DMC melee system. :)

About "Combat Slots"... It's just a slot with one of the actuall attacks from one of the stances. For example, if you look at Blind Justice (Nikana Stance) you'll see some attacks there (like Zatōs Creed , Guiding Light , etc.). Each of them require specific button combo to perform. And this is all what you need to perform them. My idea here is to allow to set our own stance and mix together (or I should say choice specific attacks that we like) from all avaliabe stances (attacks) and create perfect stance for our play style.
Also since I'm playing a lot with melee I can easilly say, that some of the attacks are better than the other one. Also by looking at Wiki we can easilly see, which attacks have some special abilities (like slam, proc, damage, etc.). By practice you can easilly say, which attacks are more effective in actual combat. It's of course all individual perspective, but that allows to create own play style in Warframe. :)

Edited September 24, 2017 by -DEVIL-WARRIOR-

[BasKy]

Mortal Kombat Armageddon is a 2006 game with a character creator that allowed you to combinate different moves into your combos.
You were given like: Arrow Up, Arrow Down, Circle, and you choose one of the teleport moves from the list. Left Arrow, Right Arrow, Square, and choose one of the projectiles moves from the list, and so on.

The same for normal combos, you could choose from a wide variety of kicks and all that, and combine them.
X (choose first move), X (choose second move), and X (choose third move). You just created your basic XXX combo. Some of them looked weird as you can imagine but that's up to the player to choose animations that look good together.

You can also choose the position your character stands, both with your melee weapon and without. In Warframe we can do the latter only.

It's just give the ability to to choose from different animations and put them together. It's doable and I would like it.

[peterc3]

Absolute nightmare to balance. Guns and warframe powers are either 1 or 2 on the things DE focuses on, melee after them. Where is the payoff for DE here, it just looks like an avalanche of extra data to maintain for no real point.

[InDueTime-EN-]

2 hours ago, -DEVIL-WARRIOR- said:

1) Multiple Combos
Each Combo will be performed in different combination (which may be hard to create). For example, you can perform combo like this: 1, 5, 2, 4, 5 | 5, 2, 2 PAUSE, 4, 3, etc. (like you want, 'till you know how to perform them - something like now).

 

I'm referring to this. You have 5 buttons, or are these combos performed in sequence?.

 

If that is that case, In the current version of warframe, there isn't really much use to performing 5 combos in succession.

The reason why I chose DMC is because it has a simple button layout(at least for melee attacks)

Only 1 button for combo attacks, yet it still looks awesome. But there were other factors that made it look good aside from just the attack button but with the current direction of warframe, mainly dual wielding, I'm sure DE can find a way to do something cool, too. 

The main issues in warframe though are that there isn't a lot of reason to do combos and no enemies that require the use of them. With Kela bouncing around and Lephantis' weak points high too high for it to be worth your time melee attacking(no areal combos), it is difficult to justify using combos. Enemies don't react to the hits properly, they mostly just jerk back like they were proc'd with impact status and some of them just stand there and shoot at you while you hit them stick prime. 

[-.Vergil.-]

@InDueTime-EN-
About your reference - I was kind of thinking of something like in DMC franchise there, but this for sure will need a lot of changes to actual combat mechanics. For sure I'd love to see some air hooks (sending enemies into the air), but so far I always enjoy actual animations. Anyway, first idea is about that you can perform any combo that you want in any order (for ex.: You can start perform 2nd Combo, then perform 4th combo if you want - like in DMC franchise), while the second idea is about direct order (from 1 to 5 in order, for ex.: You start with performing 1st Combo, then 2nd, 3rd, 4th and final 5th Combo in one chain, 'till you'll stop making attacks (pause) and you can't perform for ex. 2nd Combo as first). And basically I feel like the second idea will be better and easier to make - also it will give a new side task to missions called "Perfect Combo".

Actual Combat System isn't bad. It's maybe not that much epic looking like in DMC franchise, but still work and looks great. The "spam", "hold" and "pause" E button (with holding W/S and Blocking) system is fine and simple (like the overall game control system for both - keyboard and gamepad), but my main point here is how exacly "learning" the combos looks like and how it's limited. For now we just need a mod (no experience with specific types of melee needed) to became a melee master and we can't custom our combo strikes for our play style. A lot of players can say that overall game changes stances and action style playing is quite abandoned. For example, not many players know that parry and counter attack system exist in this game (but you need a mods), Dual Sword stance animations are quite bad, wall attacks doesn't scale with actual melee weapon speed, the precision of attacks sometimes is weird and there's not seriously a lot of stances for specific types of weapon (mostly 2 or 3 for each, while mostly one of them is good and useful). Most changes as far as I saw are focused on Waframes and Weapons (rework, rebalance, new stuff, etc.) or new quests, map reworks PoE, cosmetics, minor changes and hotfix. At this point I just feel like melee combat and dynamic action playing is quite abandoned. Only from time to time while new weapon is bring into the game we're able to look for a new, fresh and unique stance, but there's no rework with the older/actual stances and melee combat system. :/

[EpicBred]

What warframes melee needs is movement overhaul. Faster dodge while in melee mode, melee attacks need to be incorporated into the movement, e.g. a different animation for attacking after dodging. Just like every other game with a good melee system, like darksiders, dmc or dark souls. The jumping attack needs to be changed a lot, way larger knockdown, faster recovery.

And the biggest problem, they need to rework nearly every stance. They usually have a super fast cut with an extremely long recovery or anticipation pause. It doesnt look fluid at all, way too abrupt. But DE wont do that.

And you would need to be able to knock enemies back to feel an impact, but that would probably be too powerful. 

[InDueTime-EN-]

@-DEVIL-WARRIOR-

It is gonna be difficult to change the current system. 

1) They first need to isolate each animation for all the weapons. 

2) Then asign them 2 heavy (held) or light attack (tap). 

3) After that they need to assign those animation to trigger at parts of combos. 

Each combo can just be a sequence of 5 attacks, but since you have 2 animations for those 5 attacks your have 32 different variation in the combo. 

Would also like some air combos, but that would mean that they have to add or modify animations which would increase dev time. 

@EpicBred

Yes it does, and I think the main thing they have to do with melee is the ability to cancel animations/combos. 

 

[-.Vergil.-]

@InDueTime-EN-
For sure it's gonna be hard, but not impossible. Anyway a lot of experienced players can say that melee system need some rework. There's a lot of things that need a rework - melee is just one of them, however like I said it feels quite abandoned, while it's one of the main parts of the gameplay.

Also I feel like such big change would be able to push forward end-game to the new level. For now, good and experienced random team can easilly fight with lvl100 enemies - even good players can solo them without big troubles. At this point I just hope that Dev's will bring something fresh and good for end-gaming. :)