I've noticed a couple of times a deathblow will result in a mini "cut scene" of me delivering it.

anyone know how to trigger this? is it random? does it do more damage like a sneak attack by bow??

??

thanks

*bump*

anybody??

also is it possible to do a stealth kill with a 1 or 2 handed weapon? or is it strictly reserved for thieves with daggers?

???

Seems pretty random to me.

I think its random, and trust me they get annoying after seeing them over and over. I would rather not see them to be honest

i love the first person kill animations but the third person ones are really bad, most of the time the camera angle cuts away from my character. first person decapitations are amazing, to bad i cant increase the odds of that animation from triggering, really satisfying experience

I think these are the "finishing moves" we kept hearing about during the pre-release phase. I like them at the moment, but somewhere in the back of my brain I know they're going to get old eventually.

For the most part they are random, I have been able to do stealth finishers with daggers pretty often though. Werewolf one is pretty bad IMO. I love the dual dagger decapitation though.

They're random, and the chance to trigger them is adjustable in the console if you have the PC version.

@ dancing badger
wasn't aware daggers could decapitate, i might have to check it out on youtube for curiosity's sake. and your right about the werewolf finisher , gets old real fast ,happens alot and takes forever for the finisher to finish

I've wondered this as well, mostly considering the following;

With my first character, I used a SnS (Sword and Shield): I saw it at least once every 4-5 guys I killed, and damn near every wolf I killed. (Had my "Swords crit more" perk up to 2/3.)

With my second character, I use DW (Dual Wield): I rarely see it. (Have my "Swords crit more" perk up to 2/3 as well.)

I picked up a 2H (Two-Handed) and messed around with it; I saw 4-5 animations happen within 8-10min...No perks at all in the 2H screen, and less than 25 points in 2H weapons.

At first I thought it happened when you got a "Critical Hit" on an opponent with less than 50% HP. I know it doesnt have anything to do with the targets HP now, because I've done executions on people with Full HP right when I hit them the first time (With both SnS and DW)...

It cant be "Random" because SnS and 2H seem to do the crit animation 10x more often than DW, but when I first started my DW character, It seemed to happen on every other guy...To the point where I had probably seen it about 30 times between the Starting Area and Riverwood. It rarely happens now, but I stopped using real weapons and started using Dual "Bound Swords", which I dont think matter as the animation DOES still happen, but now it's extremely less frequent. I've even tried to force it to happen, but I cannot figure out how it does it. Only that when it does do it, it's rare to see, and now forces my "View" into first person for the duration of the animation (Which did not ever seem to happen with regular weapons).

My only conclusion is that frequency and "What the execution does" is based on the weapons you're using and...Maybe it has something to do with the timing of your attacks, and the targets actions during you attack (Blocking/Mid-Swing/Cowering/etc)?

They're random, and only occur with melee attacks.

I've wondered this as well, and also figured it was to do with critical hits or perhaps timing...or a combination of the two even. But then I also thought maybe perks were involved somewhere...

I don't know, wish we could get an answer.