Feinting too quick?

[SteveO]

How do ya'll feel about the speed that one feints at?  To me, it seems a bit too fast.  I don't think feinting was an intended mechanic, just something the players figured out, and thus isn't governed by any additional mechanics outside those involved (IE added delays and what not).  I mean there was no reason to feint in single player, the AI was too exploitable.  So I'm not sure they had the current way of doing it in mind. 

Anyhow, it seems to me that feinting is just a bit too fast.  The person goes from a full swing in motion to a block then can rapidly change directions.  You expect someone to feint, so on manual block you're watching for it, but they can change their swing much quicker than you can change your block leaving you with only enough time to guess at what their next attack will be.  It'd be nice if, after X amount of entering into the swing, the person suffered Y delay until they could swing again (to simulate them stopping the swing and pulling their sword back to themselves and changing attack directions) instead of just swinging, blocking, and swinging again all in an instant.

 

[kingofnoobia]

How do ya'll feel about the speed that one feints at?  To me, it seems a bit too fast.  I don't think feinting was an intended mechanic, just something the players figured out, and thus isn't governed by any additional mechanics outside those involved (IE added delays and what not). 

But it seems to me that feinting is just a bit too fast.  The person goes from a full swing in motion to a block then can rapidly change directions.  You expect someone to feint, so on manual block you're watching for it, but they can change their swing much quicker than you can change your block leaving you with only enough time to guess at what their next attack will be.  It'd be nice if, after X amount of entering into the swing, the person suffered Y delay until they could swing again (to simulate them stopping the swing and pulling their sword back to themselves and changing attack directions) instead of just swinging, blocking, and swinging again all in an instant.

I won't give my opinion on feinting speed because I'm not in beta, but I am quite sure it was intended. I think I remember it being explained somewhere in the tutorial even (or by a training field master). And the AI uses it frequently. So I am quite sure they meant it to be in the game.

For single player: AI can feint several times in just a few seconds, and I have never thought it was too fast (faster combat speed, good ai, manual blocking). Sometimes it would look a bit inhumanly fast, but then again I don't worry about that because I know humans can't feint at that speed.

 

[ManStarr]

Beautiful idea, definetly would help the game away from being a hack n' slash. 

Not that it's too much of one already, but it is there, from what I've played in single player. 

Haven't even really seen much of the beta though so, I could be totally off

 

[Plazek]

You can change your block again far faster than they can strike after the feint.

oh and http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/topic,77242.0.html

 

[SteveO]

Already saw that but that's just the guy asking how to do it.  I already know how to do it. 


And whenever I change block directions it goes very slow (guy like, slides his arm over instead of it just being there) where as with them changing attack, the block cancels the attack almost immediately and then they can swing in the next instant while your guy is still sidling his arm over to the next direction. 

 

[Mabons]

Blocking is instant, so it makes logical sense that feinting is instant too. I was practising with Arch3r this morning, and was trying manual block. Feinting works a lot better there, because as Archonosod pointed out, you don't have to center to strike again, like in auto block. I was losing to Arch3r quite a few times, so I decided for my final round, I would try feinting. It went like this, I feinted right and top, and then did a real right attack. Now it takes quite a bit of time to do that, so in the meantime your opponent can hit you, catching you off guard.

 

[Archonsod]

  I don't think feinting was an intended mechanic, just something the players figured out, and thus isn't governed by any additional mechanics outside those involved (IE added delays and what not).  I mean there was no reason to feint in single player, the AI was too exploitable. 

The AI has also been exploiting this unintended feature since .730

 

[SteveO]

Figured that was just bugs in the AI.  I've seen them do it, but only when I changed position in relation to them so figured it was the game changing direction to hit me.

But whether it was intended or not doesn't change whether it's too quick or not. 

Blocking is instant, so it makes logical sense that feinting is instant too.

Blocking with a shield may be instant, but blocking with a weapon?  Whenever you change position your hand doesn't teleport over to that area, instead it just kind of strolls along (your guy isn't even in any really big hurry to get it over there) and sometimes makes it, but most of the time you get hit since they attack much faster with the (compared to other weapons) quicker weapons, even if you're blocking with that exact same weapon.

 

[Berserker Pride]

So speeding up manual block's reaction time could be good.

 

[Archonsod]

most of the time you get hit since they attack much faster with the (compared to other weapons) quicker weapons, even if you're blocking with that exact same weapon.

Yes. That would be the point of feinting.

 

[SteveO]

Yes. That would be the point of feinting.

Yes but as it is there's no chance aside from a wild guess as to how to defend.  Feinting right now is basically an "i win" button if the other person has no shield, because they only have, at best, a 1/4 chance of surviving.  Sure they don't have a shield but that shouldn't just completely doom them to death except for against projectiles.

 

[Archonsod]

If you have a faster weapon you can still block quicker than they'll attack. If you've got a decent thrusting weapon you can probably hit them before they can attack. Longer reaching weapons let you attack before they get close enough. Or you can always dodge. Generally, a feint is only possible against someone who blocks too early so you know they've fell for it; if you're timing your blocks so you block only as and when necessary it's much harder to pull off, and of course if you keep up the offensive pressure then they'll be too busy blocking to feint. If you're getting hit regularly from feints then the odds are you're being too conservative with your defence.

 

[ScientiaExcelsa]

Feinting is the leading cause of deaths of yours truly.  Don't change it, it adds a great dimension to melee fighting.

 

[dirtbag]

Yes. That would be the point of feinting.

Yes but as it is there's no chance aside from a wild guess as to how to defend.  Feinting right now is basically an "i win" button if the other person has no shield, because they only have, at best, a 1/4 chance of surviving.  Sure they don't have a shield but that shouldn't just completely doom them to death except for against projectiles.

Mount & Blade = Up to four ways of attack directions. That makes four parry/block directions...

Reality = A lot more only limited by the imagination.

It should be a challange, and it's easier than in real life, so stop complaining

 

[Taur0s]

Theres at lot of things you can do that counters the feinting, heres one that you can do easily: Swing spam! I've been caught a lot of times feinting and my opponent just using plain swing spam got the best out of me in a fight. You can also rely on doing full attack swings (to feint) and also the basic timing-quick swing with a weapon.

I'm naming these tatics but I know once you get close in with an enemy is pretty hard to counter feinting. Well then just try to learn to use it, not that hard, I assure you its just a matter of getting used to, if you did it once, its easy to repeat. Again if you dont want to learn that at all, people who know how to use it will beat you more often, but dont worry, there a LOT more in M&B than infantry fight. Fights that will require you to feint will not happen often in servers with a lot of players, wich usually resumes to outnumbering and oportunism.

 

[SteveO]

As I said I already know how to do feinting and can do it successfully, I just think it can be done too quickly.

It should be a challange, and it's easier than in real life, so stop complaining

Yah but in real life the person is at least bound by physical limitations.  They can't do a full on swing and then suddenly change directions in the blink of an eye.

 

[dirtbag]

Your right there... It could be implemented.