In levelling mods like nGCD, they made it so that attributes levelled automatically based on skill. A character's strength did not get increased by applying a multiplier at level up. Instead, when a character levelled a skill, say blade, it also raised the related attribute, strength.

In Vanilla, Strength = (base STR + multipliers at level up)
In mods, Strength = (Blade + Blunt). Actually this formula is wrong, I don't really know the exact one used . This is jst to show that attributes are based off the skills

spooky, are you planning on making normal attacks stagger a bit?
if you are, how will you balance this to prevent enemies from staggering till killed? any plans?

also are you planning on doing time blocking? if you are, how will time blocking be better than normal blocking or even bashing?

What I hope to do (depends on what the editing tools available will allow me to do, wow what I could do if I were building a game fro the ground up.... ...er sorry back to reality...) is force "reactions" on both the one hit and the one getting hit so that you feel like you hit something other than smoke.

If I cannot do that, than I will simple do the same thing I did it in my Oblivion mod, which worked really well. Staggering only "traps" you if the attacker can hit continually and faster than you can recover and you have no options possible what so ever while you are "staggering".

Ok, I am now starting up the heavy drinking and FPS games for the next 2 days, see you guys latter!

And Merry ...what ever you celebrate!

darn.... Modern Warfare 3 is taking forever to download, for pete sake I have the fastest connection available in my town...grrrrr....

Anyway I realized I forgot to answer your question about blocking so ....

The following is from my READ ME file from my Oblivion Melee Combat Mod. I will attempt to duplicate as much as I can in Skyrim:



=====================
Blocking and Parrying
=====================

Term: "parry weapon" refers to anything that is used to block or parry.

A parry weapon can be a shield or sword or even a chair (no, blocking with a chair is not in this mod... yet!)

The bigger the parry weapon (sword, shield, 2h axe, mace and etc.) relative to your body size, the better your passive block chance. The better your block skill the better your chance to parry.

All weapons and shields (parry weapons) and even H2H are able to block up to 99% damage. However, that will only happen if your block skill is at 100%, you do not miss your block and you only use active parry. The way the system works a H2H parry of a sword blow is very hard, a weapon parry of a sword is less so and a shield parry is much easier. However if you have the required skills, you can do close in grapple blocks that can even stop a war hammer by impeding the limbs that swing the weapon instead of taking the force of the weapon from the head straight into your arm.

Passive blocks can block up to 75% damage and have less chance of success than an active parry but require almost no skill (neither player skill nor character skill).



-------------Fatigue consumed in blocking---------------


Swinging your blade weapon will use much less fatigue than when your weapon actually hits a target. For technical reasons this feature only works on living targets not things like trees.

When you throw a blow that only cuts air you lose less of your energy than when you hit something. Your "power" is transfer into you opponent when you land the shot, but not if you miss or they dodge or you purposely do not aim at anything solid, much of the momentum is "recycled" into the next shot by redirecting the weapon around and then back into the next attack.


Swinging your top heavy blunt weapon will use much more fatigue than when your weapon actually hits a target. For technical reasons this feature only works on living targets not things like trees.

When you throw a blow with a large top heavy weapon you lose more of your energy overcoming the mass at rest than when you hit something. Your "power" is "pushed" into your weapon as you get the attack up to speed. But When such a weapon hits it has many times more resistance to slowing down and all your power has already been stored into the attack at this point. Missing the target now more often means struggling with he weapon to bring it back under control for the next attack.


The bigger the attacking weapon and stronger the opponent as compared to your parry weapon, the more fatigue will be consumed in blocking. Shields and the heavy blunt weapons have the advantage of consuming less fatigue when such a weapon is used to block and parry because they can absorbed more of the force by the nature of their mass.


So there are two things that happen when you block or parry; a check is done to see if you miss the block/parry, if that happens all the damage hits you, you will actually see the actor's weapons/shield/arms get knocked aside. If you do not miss your parry/block then your block skill is used to see how much damage is deflected. Bigger heavy shields/weapons have an advantage of absorbing more damage than lighter smaller ones.

Chance to succeed is based on the size of the shield/weapon combined with your block skill and then modified by many factors such as if it is active (the first .5 of a seconds you press block) or passive (all the time after .5 of a second), as well as fatigue, any feints, whether it is a power shot or not (power shots are easier to catch because they are slower and have a lot of body language broadcasting).

If you use a big weapon and you are small and weak you will use up more fatigue to active parry and to move your parry weapon into place the first time for passive blocks! And when you are hit by bigger weapons you use more fatigue! But the bigger your parry weapon (and shield) the less fatigue you consume for the Passive block.

I hope this is making sense concerning the attacker's weapon weight, the defenders parry weapon weight and the act of moving the parry weapon to active parry and the act of moving the weapon to passive block. This is all very logical and even common sense as far as momentum goes ( no esoteric heavy weapons fighting knowledge needed ) but it is so different from most games I fear it could be confusing for players about how fatigue is drained for parry and blocking.

3 attacks with a one handed is not balanced even with the two stated below. Maybe 7-10 and it drops 32%. You gotta take into consideration blocking takes stamina and sprinting takes stamina as well as power attacks that take a LOT of stamina. Unless you are a big fatty swinging your sword 3 times isn't going to wear you out that much.. especially if you are an adventurer of sorts.

I agree with your point (I think... I mean I have never been an athletic weight, I have always been over weight even when I was fighting 3 times a week and in tournaments every weekend, but I had more endurance then a lot of the guys in the SCA even with the extra weight ) but the stamina bar is not so much a measure of your actual exhaustion level as it is a measure of your pacing in combat, at least that is how I program it to work in my mods. So yes you are right you are not going to have a heart attack after 3 blows with a 3 pound sword but you are also not practically going to swing it 20 times in a series in combat when you are in 60 to 100 pounds of armor and must reserve your attacks so that you can also provide a defense.

Heavy weapons combat is like chess at 60 miles an hour, but there is still lot of times in heavy weapons combat (most of the time actually) where you are NOT attacking! AND there are good reasons for that!

Bottom line is I agree with your point but with a lot of qualifiers!

GOD can you believe it took over 3 hours to download my Call of Duty game thru steam? I HATE STEAM so much! ok... NOW I can play the game, I hope COD modern warfare 3 is worth my selling my soul to steam ....

oh... hi Psymon...



Merry Christmas or happy holidays as you prefer my best online friend!

oh yes I am a little under the influence....

Hey buddy

and a good Yuletide to you too.

Don't hit the sauce too hard or you might have to deal with the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krampus later

Duke, here's a http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=4488, just in case you can find some use for it in the future

I see your point but if 7-10 regular attacks is what it takes to empty the stamina bar, then I'm better off leaving things as they are now. The idea of restricting so much the number of swings you can do before having to stop was due to the following reason: I wanted to include reactions to getting hit (some form of staggering). But, of course, if each hit staggers the enemy, and you can hit forever, then the enemy can't retaliate at all and fighting him is no fun anymore. That's why I thought: if each hit consumes a lot of stamina and 0 stamina means collapsing, then I can have each blow show a reaction without turning fights into 1-sided carnages.

Also, consider that stamina would regenerate very very fast so that the only way of really exhausting it would be via swinging non-stop.

Now this system works in my mind, I don't know if it will work in the game. I'll have to check it when the CS is out

spooky - reading all of your text about the blocking makes total sense and i completely approve not that you needed anyone approvement but i see the logic.
only this is that i hope that active blocking will indeed really help preventing more damage. the way i see it is that well timed block should prevent 85% of the incoming damage if you use a 1H weapon, 90% if you use a 2H weapon and 100% if you use a shield.
the result of passive blocking can be as is in the vanilla blocking - up to 80% with a shield and about 50% or 60% with a weapon... or whatever it is right now.

have you considered making perfect active blocking will cause the enemy to stagger? like a bash?

question - how does bashing compete with active blocking? i'd imagine that bashing will cause the enemy to stagger more? or maybe active blocking is great against weak attacks but against power attack active blocking will prevent most damage but won't prevent the stagger afterwards while bashing will cause the attacker to stagger and prevent 100% damage.

regarding what tiny lampe said - i think that if stamina allow for only about 3 swings than when the stamina runs out you can't power attack and you cant bash etc, but u can still move around as normal and still swing normally. the only difference is that when you swing with less than , say, 30% stamina than your hits wont stagger. the only reason for this is to prevent the attacker to hit over and over again and trap the enemy in staggering, as you called it, spooky.
you said that the staggering that happens by a hit will be short enough to allow the one that got hit to block the next attack. that's perfect and great, but what about creatures and humanoids that can't block at all? how will they defend themselves once they start getting hit?

i can live with the fact that they simply can't defend themselves for, say, 7-10 hits, but they need a counter balance somehow. like make magic more harmful for casters (do more damage or stagger or slow the target down even if it's not a frost magic) or make attacks by creatures fast enough to allow them to hit the attacker between his swings even if the creature staggers.

i think that if normal attacks stagger for a very short time, as i really think they SHOULD, than there needs to be some vital AI changes to accommodate the AI to the new effects.

what are your thoughts, spooky?

@ Topeira

I have already answered a some of your questions in previous posts (this happens a lot, not directing this at you personally as many others ask the same questions some what repeatedly . ) But until I write a Q&A for the thread I guess I should try to briefly touch on parts of your post anyway:


"I hope that active blocking will indeed really help preventing more damage.”

I will do this as soon as I have the needed commands to do it, hopefully the CK will have them or they will come quickly via the SKSE. Damage from medieval melee weapon should be parried nearly completely using high angles of defection no matter what you use to parry with (even with your limbs.) However this is only possible with extreme skill such as batting a downward 1h sword chop to the side with your hand stopping an 2h axe by impeding the attackers arms with your own. However there are limitations and conditions no mater how skilled you are. For example you need to be very close at grappling range to do this kind of thing.

Batting the weapon to the side with your hands/limbs or small parry weapons like daggers can also be done to long thrusting weapons like spears. But that is a moot point in Skyrim, for now anyway.

And similarly if you have a larger heaver parry weapon (like a tower shield) than your opponents attack weapon you will feel practicably speaking, nothing when blocking the attack (such as a cutlass or dagger attack).


"have you considered making perfect active blocking will cause the enemy to stagger? like a bash?”

Wow, um… you do realize that I am "famous" for REMOVING the block recoil from Oblivion right? Staggering only because your opponent blocked your attack was a terribly silly Game-ish mechanic that Bethesda tried in Oblivion because they were afraid players would think Oblivion combat was getting too much like a action game and less like a RPG. ( I read this in a Oblivion/Todd interview, FUNNY how they seem to have completely abandoned that fear in Skyrim.... )

Yes there are occasions that this can happen but only under rare conditions, so it is not remotely prevalent enough in real life medieval melee combat for me to spend the time moding this back into into skyrim even as a rare occurrence.

However I plan to include special counter attacks and throws that will knock the opponent back or to the side, or on the ground (and this will disarm them sometimes) as long as you have one hand empty. And a better chance to do this if you have two empty hands (this works very well in my Oblivion mod).

And some stagger will happen to the attacker for other reasons such as when you hit your opponent with a "short shot" or a top heavy weapon.



"how does bashing compete with active blocking?”

Bashing is not a form of “block”, it is an attack, a blunt type attack. But It is weaker and slower and only useful in real melee combat because it can be delivered unexpectedly and thrown at angles that are unusual in heavy weapons combat, thus a little harder to defend against.


"what about creatures and humanoids that can't block at all? how will they defend themselves once they start getting hit”

Again this will be the same way it worked in my Oblivion Mod. Animals (when they attack) try to cause more damage to you than you can do to them in the shortest time they can to minimize the damage they take.

Large strong creatures do not block, they only attack. smaller and faster animals do try to sometimes evade by going around to your back side to attack (like wolves) or dodge back and away from attacks such as a mongoose with a snake.

Intelligent beings that utilize the knowledge of levers, physics and physiology to create “ways” to use tools to attack and parry (weapons combat) do not “fight” lions and bears they hunt them!

Brilliant! Thanks spooky. A question though, I know your notes say it fixes 'auto-aim' but do you just mean the weird vanilla bow physics? What I'd like to know is, does it fix this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpsMW4DKE0o Ta

Edit: I should add that when I made that video, I was already using the early .ini tweaks that were suggested shortly after release.

yes and no...

You have to remember that this is an RPG, the way I like my RPG is that there is both player and character skill involved in the combat and other actions in the game.

So Oblivion had this, the better your character marksman skill the more the arrow would be svcked to the centerline of your living tanrget. (Hitting non living targets used a seperate system for both melee and archery weapons).

I both liked this and disliked this, as it could mess with my Locational targeting system in my mod where if you aim at the head it will do 3 times damage and if you aim at the legs it would do 1/3 damage. But I never tried to remove it from Oblivion as I did agree it was important for the characters marksman skill to be meaningful.

However.... because in this Skyrim mod I turned it off for melee combat (it was ridiculous for melee combat as you could hit an opponent that was standing to your far left or right flank even as a level one PC) this may also have tuned it off for archery as well. I am not sure as I have not tested this.

Ah ok, I see your point. Personally I prefer the Archery skill to only effect damage dealt and not the aim. Still you've explained 'why' it's happening which makes it a bit more bearable.

Thanks

Edit: Actually, how do you turn it off (the svcking towards target based on player skill)? Is it just a single console command?

Do you think it is a good idea to introduce the backstep in this system? I played gothic 2 and backstep was essential. Specially against wild animals.

And if you think about it, backstepping is important in sword fight. But in skyrim I don't use it...

If I find out I will make it an option in my mod.

Personally I very much dislike marksman skill having a big effect on the damage a projectile dose. When we talk about guns it is more obvious how silly that concept is.
But with Bows most people do not seem to understand that strength is the overwhelming factor in how how much damage you can do with a bow.

The power of a bow is measured in its draw-weight, and these days few men can pull a bow above 80lb. I have been training to someday try to pull 100lb English long bow, but the older I get the less likely that is now staring to look.

If I understand what you are asking, then this is covered under my location hit system where (among other mechanics ) attacks from the rear allow for increased damage indirectly as a result of a head shot being made much much easier to hit. You get an large accuracy boost when you and the other actors are trying to hit the head.

So any time you let someone get behind you in combat you are taking an enormous risk!

I was referring to this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eClHj56wP88&feature=related

In this video from gothic 2, the player is lvl 1 so he has to use backsteps in order to avoid dmg efficiently.

This could be a way of avoiding dmg without the stamina penalty from blocking. Or even the stagger

In skyrim, if I try to backstep, their attack range is so great that I usually get hit

Ah gothic 2, good game . Yeah I wanted something like that for Skyrim too. Notice how the orcs attacks are interrupted when he is hit first. Vanilla Skyrim encourages button mashing by making it pointless to try and dodge/backstep and hitting the enemy means getting hit too most times and thus favoring damage reduction (armor) over damage avoidance (footwork). Duke's Skyrim mod is in the early stages but even so by reducing the absurd weapon hit ranges vanilla had, I'm regularly able to avoid getting hit now.

I am using a mage currently, but after finishing my game with it, I will try this mod.

What people may not like in the gothic 2 system is that it is a bit difficult at first. So I don't expect beth to do a system like this one ever because that wouldn't please the masses.

Your combat mods for Oblivion were AWESOME ! It is great that you are making something similiar to Skyrim aswell. Good luck with that !
Anyway, I was playing the good old Severance: Blade Of Darkness (I hope everyone played this gem) and thought, why on earth is that combat mechanic so dynamic and fun ?
Its only a idea (maybe a wish, that I hope you will include in your mod). Remember the stamina/exhaustion facotr ? When a character attacked, the swing drained some stamina. With each next attack it drained another portion of the bar. When you stopped for a second (enough for an opponent to attack) it recharged quite quickly. When you tried to attack while you had zero stamina (or very low) your attack was practicaly useless, and you became vulnerable because you hade to "take a breath". Your mod reminds me this. You are trying to involve some kind of stamina-managment, when player should be aware of how much stamina he has, and certain rhythm (I know you really like this word :-D ), when you attack -> make a break -> defend -> counter-attack, etc. Brain and skill included, button mashing excluded.
Another thing I thought of are combos. I know they are ... a bit cheesy, but if somebody made a GOOD system for combos, it would be great addition. I am not talking here about fantasy-hyper-damage combos (like Devil May Cry, although its a great game). Again, Blade Of Darkness is a great example. Four basic attacks (attack + directional arrow), plus some more advanced techniques (attack, then press UP and DOWN -> makes a X cross with a sword).
Even without all this stuff, I believe that your mod will make combat exciting and dangerous.
Again, good luck !

I just discovered a game named mount&blade. The combat system is impressive. Is it possible to do something similar in skyrim?

Deadly Reflex had a momentum and other M&B elements. Will require scripting for sure.

Thanks for answering me so specifically, spooky.

this reply is going to be long, but that's just because im taking your effort very seriously.

While i do like your answers, i think i might miscommunication my intension since these answers didnt really hit my points.
I'd like to talk in easier to understand terms. I hope you dont mind me calling these mechanics in these names as they might not exactly represent the real life counterparts.

i think attacks in skyrim have 3 levels – from the weakest to the strongest -
normal\weak attacks: 1H normal attacks are the weakest.
medium attacks: 1H power attacks and normal 2H attacks are stronger (they are also just as slow i think)
powerful attacks: 2H power attacks are the strongest.
So in the game im thinking there will be 3 defensive moves –

• Bashing: as it is in the game right now.
  
• Blocking: passive blocking. Holding the block button more than 0.5 seconds befor the incoming attack will make it passive. Blocking with weapons lets about 35% of the damage through . blocking with a shield lets about 15% damage through.
  
• Parying: it's what you call "active blocking". Blocking 0.5 seconds before the incoming attack. I think that parrying should prevent 100% damage AND cause the enemy to stagger if he attacked with normal 1H attacks (weak attacks). Here's why:
  
  IRL when a warrior fore-sees an incoming attack and he is fully prepared to react to it he will probably manage to deflect the enemy's attack or make a way to turn the enemy's attack into his own attack. Open him up for a counter. I come from martial arts background so i understand what it means to know what's coming at me and how to turn it into my own attack or how to open my enemy using effective countering\blocking. The way many games see it – if you time your block (parry) than it represents a block that deflects the enemy's weapon to open him up for a counter attack. Gameplay wise, it rewards a player for his instincts by giving him a better opportunity to do counter damage as if his block was stronger than the opponents attack.
  
  imagine this situation – a bandits is fighting the PC andd he's hitting him with a flurry of 4 attacks. If the PC is holding block constantly than he will be hit 4 consecutive times and take a little damage through his block. The PC needs to have a way to BREAK the bandit's combo and open him up mid-combo to his counter attacks.
  i find it makes sense that as the PC if i let go of the block between hits and re-press it than i do a parry and cause the enemy to stop his combo and stagger him for long enough to allow me at least one hit normal or medium hit.
  
  there needs to be a way to stop the bandit's combo in the middle. Also there needs to be a way to reward the player if he reacts in time to the enemy's attack. Right now your mod will prevent all damage with parryings (active block), right? Is that enough? How will the PC open an enemy to a counter attack than?
  
  also im thinking about a reversed situation – the PC is attacking a bandit over and over andd over again. The bandit will stagger, but staggering is shorter than a sword swing so the bandit will recover before the PC's next attack. If the bandit blocks immediately as the PC keeps on with his combo than that block by the bandit is actually a parry. It will cause the player to stagger back a bit so the bandit can slip an attack in. This is an interesting situation where the PC is not necessarily ready for his own stagger and now he needs to quickly change his plans from attacking into a parry of his own because now he is open.
  
  this dynamic exists IRL and it should exist in the game, i believe.
  
  was my point clear?
  
  
  
  regarding bashing – am i the only one who thinks this move is over powered? My level 43 warrior has 340 stamina and only 150 health so i die in 2 attack from powerful warriors, but i can bash, attack attack, bash, attack, attack, bash, attack attack, power attack almost any enemy to death. Bashing is a move with barely no penalty and a huge advantage. It can be exploited too much.
  i dont know how bashing works in real sword fighting, but i can only suggest ideas from a gameplay mechanics perspective:
  
  bashing shouldn't stagger every enemy all the time but only in specific occasions. It should be a move that fits certain situations but not all of them. In skyrim if the enemy is idle (not blocking, not attacking) than u can bash him. If he is attacking – you can bash him. If he is blocking – you can bash him. It's all the same.
  i think that bashing should be a REACTION to something. I think that if the enemy is idle than bashing does nothing (it's a waste of stamina). If the enemy is blocking than bashing will open him up from a quick attack. If the enemy is power attacking than the bash will cause the enemy to stagger (like it is in the game right now). If the enemy is doing normal attacks with a 1H weapon than bashing is too slow to do anything and the basher will be hit (like it is in skyrim right now).

so this is how i see blocking, bashing and countering:

blocking is easy to do and it's passive so it's less rewarding – some damage goes through. Not effective against 2H power attack at all. Will cause the blocker to stagger and a lot of damage will go through.

bashing is used to open up enemy's block for a normal attack if he's blocking or to prevent damage from a power attack by preventing it.

Countering – it will always negate all damage, BUT will cause the attacker to recoil\stagger if its done to a weak normal attack with a 1H weapon.
it will NOT stagger an attacker who does a power attack with 1H weapon OR a normal attack with a 2H weapon.
if a counter is done to a 2H power attack than the defender will take no damage but still stagger or fall to his knee. He should have bashed.

this creates, in my humble opinion of course, the interesting tactics of the defender -
block if you dont know what's coming.
counter normal or medium attacks.
bash powerful attacks.
it forces the defender to play smart and react accordingly in a more precise manner.

Regarding staggering – i missed my point entirely i think.

What i means it that if normal attacks cause stagger than what will prevent a character that cant block (like dual wielders , magicians, bears, spiders, trolls etc) from being trapped by a stagger till it's dead?
if a character can block that it blocks and if it parries than the attacker will stagger and become the defender letting the former defender out of the defensive role.
but if a character cant block than he will stagger till dead, no? If it's the PC character than this is REALLY annoying.

if you could implement a dodge movements like this one:
http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=4488
by tapping side or back with sprint than this can let humanoid characters out of staggering loops. But that's only IF you can implement a dodge movement and it doesnt apply to animals\monsters.
im trying to think about a more feasible way to solve this issue without a dodging mechanics that might be hard to implement.

the easiest way is to make beasts NOT stagger form attacks. But what about spell casters? They cant block and it makes sense they will stagger from attacks. What will they do?

that was my question...
i dont have an answer for it...