Chamber blocking help?

[Armstrong]

I'm finding chamber blocking to be pretty risky at the moment, against a cpu I can land them about 80% of the time because their intentions are simple to read
and they don't strafe, against other players on the other hand I'm land them more like 30% of the time which of course proves to be more detrimental than good.

Could anyone provide some tips on chamber blocking decent opponents?

 

[Alene]

My tip is: Don't rely on chamber blocking. Decent opponents may held their attacks, and chambering those is very difficult.

 

[LeRoux]

Keep on practicing.

 

[Girl_with_Pike]

It will always be risky.  Some people are vulnerable to chambers, and some people are not.  Its a person by person situation and isnt always neccessarily tied to how good they are.

The way I practice it is to fight normally, but pick 1 side to work chambers on and 3 sides to block.  This way you wont be learning off of dummy bots, and will be better able to integrate it into your fighting style.  When you get proficient at the side you pick, switch to a different direction.

some people will practice with the good old pass the chamber game where two people just take turns chambering eachother's chamberblock.  This is a  good way to learn how the distance and angle also effect your chamberblock, but by itself will not make you proficient at actually chamber blocking.

Another thing is dont advertiese to the world that you are chamber blocking.  Things to avoid are standing still in "chamber stance" which is basically just standing there waiting to chamber the first attack you can.  Most of the time if I see somebody is moving very little and doesnt have a block or attack ready to go, I just assume they are going to try to chamber block.  It's that obvious.  Don't try to chamber block every attack either.  It will be more effective if you use it less frequently.

 

[Lt]

In duelling chambers work. But as is said that better opponents usually hold their slashes wich makes chambering nearly impossible. And if you are constantly making chambers they will lose the element of surprise. Stab chambers are mos effective ones. The ones i only use.

I practised chambers in warband sp tutorial against the bots and then in duel servers.

 

[Orion]

It will always be risky.  Some people are vulnerable to chambers, and some people are not.  Its a person by person situation and isnt always neccessarily tied to how good they are.

The way I practice it is to fight normally, but pick 1 side to work chambers on and 3 sides to block.  This way you wont be learning off of dummy bots, and will be better able to integrate it into your fighting style.  When you get proficient at the side you pick, switch to a different direction.

some people will practice with the good old pass the chamber game where two people just take turns chambering eachother's chamberblock.  This is a  good way to learn how the distance and angle also effect your chamberblock, but by itself will not make you proficient at actually chamber blocking.

Another thing is dont advertiese to the world that you are chamber blocking.  Things to avoid are standing still in "chamber stance" which is basically just standing there waiting to chamber the first attack you can.  Most of the time if I see somebody is moving very little and doesnt have a block or attack ready to go, I just assume they are going to try to chamber block.  It's that obvious.  Don't try to chamber block every attack either.  It will be more effective if you use it less frequently.

All sound advice. +1

One little note I'll add is that you don't have to tap your attack button to chamber block. You can hold it, and it will hold your swing when you chamber block your opponent. You might think that defeats the purpose, because chamber blocks are the quickest way to retaliate against an attack, but some opponents will re-chamber you. Holding a chamber really screws them up.

 

[Lord Rich]

It really depends what weapon you are using, the 1H swords are the best in my opinion for chambering. Chambering a thrust with an overhead can be very effective, especially against polearms. The left swing is also effective for chambering and you can get a lot of kills with it.

The best thing to do with it is to use it sparingly. If you use it all the time you will die as soon as someone figures out you are chambering. Analyse your opponent a bit before using it, look for whether they are holding or not for a few hits. You should then be able to safely use it once, then just watch a bit more for holds and use it again. It has the tendency of slowing an opponents whole game down if they do figure that you are chambering and you can use that to your advantage.

 

[Deafening]

A lot of good advice here, but it's mostly saying what not to do, rather than how to actually do it [chamber against good players].

Before you even you think about seriously chamber blocking in a duel, you need to bump up that percentage. Get it up to 95%, preferably 99% success against bots.

Contrary to popular belief, it's actually very possible to [attempt to] chamber every attack. This is how I fight, and I wouldn't really recommend it. But, if you really want to know how to do this without dying -- you will need to die. A lot. Like a ****ton. Slowly but surely you'll develop a sort of sixth sense w/r/t when people will hold their attacks. This isn't to alert you when not to chamber -- you will be attempting to chamber everything -- it's simply a reflex to make you cancel that attempted chamber. Of course, there are times when it would be physically/electronically? impossible to start a chamber in time-- you'll need to die to develop the sense for that as well.

Eventually you'll get to the point where you can chamber like nobody's business. And it'll be pretty cool man. One caveat though: chamber blocking against good players does absolutely nothing (excluding stab chambers). So, it's satisfying and all to land them, but ultimately you'll realize it was a waste of time, and so you'll feel like this for a while. But, total chamber mastery is priceless against average players, so after a bit you'll feel more of an empty .

Examples of this [pointless] style: This duel against Sarah
Ten chamber attempts here. Some are pretty short, would probably need slo-mo to catch them -- my first chamber attempt here lasts for like five frames. (Sixth-sense in action!). A couple other chamber/attempt-heavy duels are at 4:30 and 10:10. I counted 80 chambers/attempts throughout this whole video. Why I bothered to count, no idea. And there would be way more if Sarah had a different style -- tons of holds here, etc.

Basically chambering good players gets you killed and no kills. But, always fun to try, usually.

 

[Tatari_okan]

If your opponent is not a newbie, heard of chamberblock at least once, it is waste of time unless you are mastered at timing it. During the action, most people don't care how their opponent blocked it, by chamber or manual block. They focus on the next move (most of the time), so unless your opponent is not good at blocking, or doesn't distract by chamber block, it is still possible knocked down by your opponent.
In duels it is usefull, I agree, but it is also easy to figure out and doesn't take much time too. In battlefield, it is more effective in my opinion, because your opponents have less clue about how you fight.

 

[Kipsleverworst]

If your opponent is not a newbie, heard of chamberblock at least once, it is waste of time unless you are mastered at timing it. During the action, most people don't care how their opponent blocked it, by chamber or manual block. They focus on the next move (most of the time), so unless your opponent is not good at blocking, or doesn't distract by chamber block, it is still possible knocked down by your opponent.
In duels it is usefull, I agree, but it is also easy to figure out and doesn't take much time too. In battlefield, it is more effective in my opinion, because your opponents have less clue about how you fight.

true

 

[Lord Rich]

A lot of good advice here, but it's mostly saying what not to do, rather than how to actually do it [chamber against good players].

Before you even you think about seriously chamber blocking in a duel, you need to bump up that percentage. Get it up to 95%, preferably 99% success against bots.

Contrary to popular belief, it's actually very possible to [attempt to] chamber every attack. This is how I fight, and I wouldn't really recommend it. But, if you really want to know how to do this without dying -- you will need to die. A lot. Like a ****ton. Slowly but surely you'll develop a sort of sixth sense w/r/t when people will hold their attacks. This isn't to alert you when not to chamber -- you will be attempting to chamber everything -- it's simply a reflex to make you cancel that attempted chamber. Of course, there are times when it would be physically/electronically? impossible to start a chamber in time-- you'll need to die to develop the sense for that as well.

Eventually you'll get to the point where you can chamber like nobody's business. And it'll be pretty cool man. One caveat though: chamber blocking against good players does absolutely nothing (excluding stab chambers). So, it's satisfying and all to land them, but ultimately you'll realize it was a waste of time, and so you'll feel like this for a while. But, total chamber mastery is priceless against average players, so after a bit you'll feel more of an empty .

Examples of this [pointless] style: This duel against Sarah
Ten chamber attempts here. Some are pretty short, would probably need slo-mo to catch them -- my first chamber attempt here lasts for like five frames. (Sixth-sense in action!). A couple other chamber/attempt-heavy duels are at 4:30 and 10:10. I counted 80 chambers/attempts throughout this whole video. Why I bothered to count, no idea. And there would be way more if Sarah had a different style -- tons of holds here, etc.

Basically chambering good players gets you killed and no kills. But, always fun to try, usually.

It's worth trying to chamber everything simply to develop your own chamber ability sure, however to chamber everything as an actual style is just failure (believe me I know XD). Anyone who knows how to counter will kill you on your second/third chamber attempt and odds are that because you try and chamber everything you won't be waiting for those moments when the chamber is most effective.

If you use it in moderation it can be a very powerful move against any class of player. But you have to recognise that it is easily countered so you cannot use it all the time. I know a few techniques for theoretically chambering holds but in general its far too risky since there is too much variation in what the opponent does and so you require a very good knowledge of whether they are using timed holds or reactive holds (this is where you hold while waiting for your opponent to release) etc...

However you can safely chamber a thrust in nearly all situations. Even a held thrust can be chambered simply by moving towards the opponent. Generally they either have to release at a specific point or they will risk their attack bouncing off you because you are too close.

You can chamber couched lances too (make sure you have a shield equipped!), which has the benefit of reducing damage to your shield and also gives you a possible chance of hitting them as they pass if they aren't moving fast enough. Not a particularly useful technique against skilled players though as they will just bump-stab you .

 

[Deafening]

It's worth trying to chamber everything simply do develop your own chamber ability sure, however to chamber everything as an actual style is just failure (believe me I know XD). Anyone who knows how to counter will kill you on your second/third chamber attempt and odds are that because you try and chamber everything you won't be waiting for those moments when the chamber is most effective.

I'm kind of wondering whether you even watched that video / correctly read what I said, haha. I understand the skepticism since we're not familiar with one another. But yeah, you underestimate exactly how many obscure chambering techniques and set-ups I managed to develop...! Honestly. Someday I'll make a video/guide revealing the work of my months of experimenting.

But yeah, there are a select number of people who will actively make it impossible to for you to ever perform a chamber-block, much less land it. M comes to mind. Actually, I managed to stab-chamber M a number of times upon our first few encounters. But he quickly and permanently adapted, d'oh.

Given my supposed adoration of chamber blocking, it's probably counter-intuitive that I find one of the greatest virtues of Fastest speed to be that "reaction holds" don't/can't exist. It's humanly impossible to release in time. Likewise, any chamber is inherently risky on fastest -- you can't reactively chamber any holds, even stabs. Medium speed makes a Chamber-attempt Everything style much easier. But there's a trade-off in that chambers are almost completely useless on medium. There is/can be actual payoff for chambering on fastest. Anyway, not to derail with another fastest vs. medium thing.

 

[Lord Rich]

I think that would be the point though, you are playing on fastest and I am playing on medium. I did watch the video a while back as well but I have developed several techniques of my own for chambering, would be interesting to compare notes at some time.

Also you can't reactively chamber holds on medium either. At least not for 95% of the attacks. You can do it for some of the extremely slow weapons or maybe if a swing is very badly placed so it will hit you at the very end of its arc. Chambers also get me plenty of kills against both skilled and unskilled opponents so I would hardly call them 'nearly completely useless'. From what I can see fastest is easier for chambering as you have exactly the same risks with a much higher chance of reward. In fact since I would guess its very difficult to reactively hold on an opponent on fastest you would also have lower risks as well since you only need to worry about timed holds.

EDIT:

Also I should point out not all of my previous post was entirely directed at you, some of it was just general advice.

 

[Juve]

In response to the OP:

I chamber a lot more than I should, especially while dueling. Good duelists will block any chamber besides for the odd stab chamber, so it really doesn't help me much at all.

That being said, I find chambers can be very effective in Battle or TDM modes. If you are able to get really good at a single chamber, just have that in the back of your mind during battles; you can really surprise enemy infantry with a quick chamber. Even better players can be surprised by a quick left chamber during a melee exchange.

 

[findecanno]

One thing that I would like to add about chambering from my own experience is something that I call chambering a feint. Basically, this is where you see your opponent coming to with an unheld swing, you try and chamber it, but they feint. Now what some people are like "Oh crap, my chamber missed, I better block" so they go right away into blocking. What I try and do sometimes is go through with my chamber swing and try and hit through the feint. I guess its a form of double swinging in a way, except if your opponent doesn't feint, you still get a chamber, so you are covered.

However, depending on footwork and what kind of feint it is, this won't always work and it is sometimes better to cancel the chamber and block instead. Its all about practicing and being able to "feel" what will work when.

 

[Lord Rich]

One thing that I would like to add about chambering from my own experience is something that I call chambering a feint. Basically, this is where you see your opponent coming to with an unheld swing, you try and chamber it, but they feint. Now what some people are like "Oh crap, my chamber missed, I better block" so they go right away into blocking. What I try and do sometimes is go through with my chamber swing and try and hit through the feint. I guess its a form of double swinging in a way, except if your opponent doesn't feint, you still get a chamber, so you are covered.

However, depending on footwork and what kind of feint it is, this won't always work and it is sometimes better to cancel the chamber and block instead. Its all about practicing and being able to "feel" what will work when.

Yeah you can quite often get kills this way, calling the bluff on their feint effectively.

 

[Mr.X]

If your opponent is not a newbie, heard of chamberblock at least once, it is waste of time unless you are mastered at timing it. During the action, most people don't care how their opponent blocked it, by chamber or manual block. They focus on the next move (most of the time), so unless your opponent is not good at blocking, or doesn't distract by chamber block, it is still possible knocked down by your opponent.
In duels it is usefull, I agree, but it is also easy to figure out and doesn't take much time too. In battlefield, it is more effective in my opinion, because your opponents have less clue about how you fight.

true

Not true. Most people who can block well enough still will miss a block on a chamber attack. It's really fast, and often stutters if you're playing at lower graphics, which gives you a ridiculously small reaction time compared to normal attacks. Especially if they're not expecting it. I really only know a few very top tier players who can consistently block chambered attacks when it's not obviously expected (i.e, your not doing that chamber stance thing that someone talked about earlier). Myself included :p (reread what Juvenile said pl0x)

Also you can't reactively chamber holds on medium either. At least not for 95% of the attacks. You can do it for some of the extremely slow weapons or maybe if a swing is very badly placed so it will hit you at the very end of its arc.

Not true. You can reactively chamber holds. You just have to have really good timing and very smooth graphics going. The whole "95%" of attacks is utter bull**** and pulled completely from your ass (did you really test this a bunch of times and found that you only reactively chambered a hold 5% of the times? Didn't think so.) Rhade used to do it consistently, Halely did it consistently, and Mad Dawg has done it to me several times (although I don't think it's part of his standard toolbox)

In response to the OP:

I chamber a lot more than I should, especially while dueling. Good duelists will block any chamber besides for the odd stab chamber, so it really doesn't help me much at all.

That being said, I find chambers can be very effective in Battle or TDM modes. If you are able to get really good at a single chamber, just have that in the back of your mind during battles; you can really surprise enemy infantry with a quick chamber. Even better players can be surprised by a quick left chamber during a melee exchange.

Completely agree.

One thing that I would like to add about chambering from my own experience is something that I call chambering a feint. Basically, this is where you see your opponent coming to with an unheld swing, you try and chamber it, but they feint. Now what some people are like "Oh crap, my chamber missed, I better block" so they go right away into blocking. What I try and do sometimes is go through with my chamber swing and try and hit through the feint. I guess its a form of double swinging in a way, except if your opponent doesn't feint, you still get a chamber, so you are covered.

However, depending on footwork and what kind of feint it is, this won't always work and it is sometimes better to cancel the chamber and block instead. Its all about practicing and being able to "feel" what will work when.

Extremely good advice



And just a general note: Stab chambers aren't technically "impossible" to block IF you can manage to gain enough time to recover from your attack being chambered. Meaning, if you and you're opponent are pretty far away, or like he backs up and you back up and then he moves into the chamber as your backing up, you can still get enough time to block it. Or if he spins it and increases the time the swing takes. When you're extremely up close though, it is effectively impossible. (note: "effectively")

 

[Deafening]

Not true. You can reactively chamber holds. You just have to have really good timing and very smooth graphics going. The whole "95%" of attacks is utter bull**** and pulled completely from your ass (did you really test this a bunch of times and found that you only reactively chambered a hold 5% of the times? Didn't think so.) Rhade used to do it consistently, Halely did it consistently, and Mad Dawg has done it to me several times (although I don't think it's part of his standard toolbox)

Err.. X... bro...

Have you ever sat there and tried to chamber a hold? Sit there with a buddy, and try to chamber on reaction alone. It's 100% impossible on fastest. One hundred percent.

You're confusing this with the ability to anticipate holds [and subsequently chamber them]. Good players can chamber holds -- but it's absolutely not done on reaction.

Beer's tip: I thought that was common knowledge/practice? That's really chambering's main utility. It's the "safe counter-attack". The only feints it doesn't work on are Fook and EU-feints.

I talk about a lot of this in that guide I occasionally mention I've written but haven't finished, and probably won't get around to.

 

[Mr.X]

Not true. You can reactively chamber holds. You just have to have really good timing and very smooth graphics going. The whole "95%" of attacks is utter bull**** and pulled completely from your ass (did you really test this a bunch of times and found that you only reactively chambered a hold 5% of the times? Didn't think so.) Rhade used to do it consistently, Halely did it consistently, and Mad Dawg has done it to me several times (although I don't think it's part of his standard toolbox)

Err.. X... bro...

Have you ever sat there and tried to chamber a hold? Sit there with a buddy, and try to chamber on reaction alone. It's 100% impossible on fastest. One hundred percent.

You're confusing this with the ability to anticipate holds [and subsequently chamber them]. Good players can chamber holds -- but it's absolutely not done on reaction.

Beer's tip: I thought that was common knowledge/practice? That's really chambering's main utility. It's the "safe counter-attack". The only feints it doesn't work on are Fook and EU-feints.

I talk about a lot of this in that guide I occasionally mention I've written but haven't finished, and probably won't get around to.

Mad Dawg's done it to me more than once on a side attack that was held at the opening of a duel for an odd amount of time. So no, not impossible. Haley also did it to me several times per duel. I've only seen rhade do it, but I have seen it

 

[Ron Burgundy]

Not true. You can reactively chamber holds. You just have to have really good timing and very smooth graphics going. The whole "95%" of attacks is utter bull**** and pulled completely from your ass (did you really test this a bunch of times and found that you only reactively chambered a hold 5% of the times? Didn't think so.) Rhade used to do it consistently, Halely did it consistently, and Mad Dawg has done it to me several times (although I don't think it's part of his standard toolbox)

Err.. X... bro...

Have you ever sat there and tried to chamber a hold? Sit there with a buddy, and try to chamber on reaction alone. It's 100% impossible on fastest. One hundred percent.

You're confusing this with the ability to anticipate holds [and subsequently chamber them]. Good players can chamber holds -- but it's absolutely not done on reaction.

Beer's tip: I thought that was common knowledge/practice? That's really chambering's main utility. It's the "safe counter-attack". The only feints it doesn't work on are Fook and EU-feints.

I talk about a lot of this in that guide I occasionally mention I've written but haven't finished, and probably won't get around to.

Mad Dawg's done it to me more than once on a side attack that was held at the opening of a duel for an odd amount of time. So no, not impossible. Haley also did it to me several times per duel. I've only seen rhade do it, but I have seen it

Nah, Mad Dawg is just very good about reading players and their tendencies. If the opponent believes you will try to chamber they can easily mess it up by holding for an awkward amount of time. Chambering holds is all about anticipation and some guesswork. In my dueling against Mad he used to always be able to count on my hold because it was predictable. Since then I have mixed it up and it is very rare that he successfully chambers a hold, though when he does it is always the same timing I used to use all the time. The key thing is that when Mad goes for it he is almost always ready to block if it doesn't work out.