Do we really need a combat overhaul? What are your opinions on it?

[HalfAxd]

14 hours ago, Chuckerton said:

if there was a bleedout mechanic then yeah crude bows wouldnt need to one hit kill hunting creatures

VS does have an interesting mechanic if you stay hidden (sneak) the animal won't know which way to run when hit and it will only run a short distance and lay down ( I assume to rest).  This allows you to stalk the animal effectively by continuing to sneak up for the follow-on shot.  This also forces you to make decisions regarding what terrain to "push" the animal toward in a effort to keep line of sight (aka. push it toward the open field)...  again, pits/cliffs are historically effective in this way.

On bleeding out... IRL not all hits will cause the animal to bleed out.  I would love to see hit placement have specific effects though... would be cool!

I totally agree on having a better feeling bow mechanic... I really love the bow in 7 Days 2 Die...  feels satisfying to use...

Enjoy!

[Thorfinn]

On 4/10/2025 at 3:42 AM, PrismaticaDev said:

I think everyone can agree that the combat doesn't feel "fun".

No. I don't mind the combat at all. It's rather that the rewards means it's a waste of time. Which was obviously the inten or the rewards would have been better.. 

Mining is hardly something I'd call "fun". It's just something you have to do to progress. Panning is double-plus unfun, but fortunately you do not have to do it to progress. Is farming fun? Plant a seed, wait a while, harvest, repeat. Not really, but it's what you accomplish, not the click to plant, click to harvest that makes it worthwhile.

Combat is way better than those, but since you don't need it to progress...

[EDIT]

I'd even go further. Apart from the feeling of accomplishment you get from achieving your goals, combat is one of the more enjoyable aspects of the game. It can surprise you from behind the very next bush. Everything else, clayforming, firing, steelmaking, forging, chiseling, etc. is completely deterministic, completely within your control.

Edited April 11, 2025 by Thorfinn

[LadyWYT]

1 hour ago, Thorfinn said:

I'd even go further. Apart from the feeling of accomplishment you get from achieving your goals, combat is one of the more enjoyable aspects of the game. It can surprise you from behind the very next bush.

Well-said. It's not going to be everyone's cup of tea, sure, but it gets the job done and doesn't shift so much focus to combat that the tone of Vintage Story changes. I'd also hazard a guess that some of the issues players have with combat is due to creatures actually behaving somewhat realistically. That is, they'll try to run away if wounded too badly, and they also won't hesitate to charge at you either, instead of giving you a generous amount of time to react by telegraphing what they're about to do. Once you get the timing of various things down, and figure out your preferred combat style, it's rather satisfying to smack the monsters around whenever they get in your way.

[Thorfinn]

Right, and, really, you don't have to flog combat to the point it becomes tiresome. If you try to make a meal out of it, I imagine it does get a little repetitious. But as salt? Spice?

Consider how many other parts of the game you could be replaced by a bot. Point to the block you placed the flint you want to knap, tell it what you want knapped, and a bot could easily replace you, and do it quicker. Smithing, obviously. It could easily minimize durability loss on your hammer. Baking a pie to perfection? Finding resin on a tree?

What you have is the ability to plan out your progression. That, to me, is the appeal. Every game is at least somewhat different. If you didn't find enough copper your first day, you have to decide how you want to top yourself up to 40. Which will vary greatly depending on your starting location. If you didn't get enough flax seeds, where in this world do you need to go look for more?

Edited April 11, 2025 by Thorfinn

[Maelstrom]

On 4/10/2025 at 2:42 AM, PrismaticaDev said:

I think everyone can agree that the combat doesn't feel "fun". People avoid it entirely because they don't enjoy it, and the people who do engage seem to unanimously agree it could do with an overhaul.

Count me the oddball then.  I enjoy combat as it currently is and don't think it needs an overhaul.  Addition of the shiver and bowtorn has changed combat in a meaningful way for me in that the old strategy no longer works.  I've had to come up with different strategies to deal with these new mobs which also changes the overall preparation for a night out on the town or the upcoming storm.

I get it that there are those people who are combat experts and current combat leaves a lot to be desired for them. There's lots of us that aren't so combat proficient that increasing combat difficulty would be a huge detractor from the game and could even cause people to quit playing altogether.  Similarly, there are those that want a more robust cooking mechanic that are left wanting as well.  For both there are mods to adjust their level of enjoyment, which is something Tyron designed into the game AND encourages!

[Zer0pig316]

My two cents: No. I don't think it needs an "overhaul" or complex mechanics added. I think the point and click works well enough. I do agree with some points made about hitbox adjustments, not sprinting backwards or being able to spam spears. Little tweaks. If anything, mob AI and pathing being improved slightly could make for more engaging combat without overcomplicating the combat system. I also like some of the suggestions around hunting mechanics but feel that is a separate topic.

My opinion is actually that I don't want combat to be "fun". I want it to be scary, clumsy, frantic, and one-sided. I think the current, somewhat lackluster combat mechanics play well to this. Sure, I have mastered some of the strategies now and my current playthrough is at a point that the threats are not as dangerous but I remember my early encounters when I learned the wolves were no joke. A howl would stop me in my tracks or send me running. I miss that. The mobs in VS are not "enemies", they are environmental controls. They give me a reason to take shelter at night or have caution when I'm out too late. They add a risk factor to caving. They force me to have awareness of my surroundings when gathering resources or hunting. They check me when I am careless or too bold. They remind me that I am surviving in this world not the master of it. Every milestone toward mastery of the environment feels that much more satisfying because of it.

I also think it is a bit black and white to say people either enjoy it and want improvement or just avoid it altogether. I don't play for the combat. But, I neither seek it out nor avoid it. When I engage in it because I have to, or because I have considered the risk worth the reward, it works and feels good. But I believe the combat is an integral part of the game. Because for me, it isn't the "act" of the combat encounter that is most important but the impact those environmental controls have on the overall gameplay experience. I think that people overlook sometimes that when you change the combat system in a game like VS, you are potentially altering or throwing out of balance the entire overall gameplay experience. I am not saying I would be staunchly opposed if balanced changes were made but I frankly can't agree that any of the aforementioned changes would bring that much more measurable depth to combat to justify altering the overall gameplay experience.

Do I want to trade my overall gameplay experience for a dodge roll? No.

 

[Thorfinn]

I guess at core, I don't understand why every game must become a "twitch" game. Games like Banished kind of defined the survival game genre, and had no combat at all. No twitch, all strategy. SdV bolted on a combat system, which was inferior to VS in terms of combat in all but one way -- weapons had special attacks. If you wanted to set "high scores", sure, you needed to be good at twitch, but you could also do perfectly fine skipping combat almost entirely, focusing on growing crops and petting animals. Slower, sure, but Kroebus still sold iridium sprinklers, there are multiple sources of iridium if you really must have the iridium hoe, and Clive (?) sells the base metals so you could build machines and upgrade your tools. You just have a slower development of your farm.

I'm not sure what is meant by "machine gunning" spears. I've tried to duplicate that, but if I don't let the crosshairs narrow enough, I either abort the throw entirely, or it misses a critter at just barely out of stabbing range. Other than that, spears seem to have about the same cooldown as any critter has. But even if there's some way to toss the things faster, you are the one running the keyboard and mouse. If you think it's cheesy, don't do it. Same with sprinting backwards. You don't need someone to prevent you from doing cheesy things. A little willpower is all it takes.

 

[HalfAxd]

41 minutes ago, Thorfinn said:

I'm not sure what is meant by "machine gunning" spears.

You can throw spears about as fast as you can hit the button to do it... works really well on those short range encounters.  Agreed... don't have to do it, but when the alternative is running across the map to pick up my berry pie...  well, you know... 

[LadyWYT]

5 hours ago, Thorfinn said:

I'm not sure what is meant by "machine gunning" spears. I've tried to duplicate that, but if I don't let the crosshairs narrow enough, I either abort the throw entirely, or it misses a critter at just barely out of stabbing range.

4 hours ago, HalfAxd said:

You can throw spears about as fast as you can hit the button to do it... works really well on those short range encounters.  Agreed... don't have to do it, but when the alternative is running across the map to pick up my berry pie...  well, you know... 

In my experience, you need to be standing still and time your throws just right in order to achieve this. If you're moving at all, it throws off your aim way too much. You can still fire fairly fast while moving, but it requires mastering the art of pausing just long enough to pop off a shot and immediately start moving again.

I would say that the recent improvements to creature AI makes "machine-gunning" a lot less viable, since the creatures will now react to being shot.

[Josiah Gibbonson]

16 hours ago, Zer0pig316 said:

My opinion is actually that I don't want combat to be "fun". I want it to be scary, clumsy, frantic, and one-sided

That's absolutely not what we have now, lol. Hence why I wish for an improvement.  Maybe the first hour into the game it feels like that, but after you learn how bad the AI of the game is, they're like these irritating little gremlins who won't pose a challenge if you just avoid them. And if you do take thwm on, it's either going to be mind-numbingly brainless or you'll get no-scoped by thirteen dozen small rocks if you don't like...block yourself in. 

[Josiah Gibbonson]

5 hours ago, Thorfinn said:

not sure what is meant by "machine gunning" spears

What I meant by it is you just have like seven spears on you at any given time and spam throw them. After you throw one, it replaces the one you just threw with another one in your inventory. You can essentially overpower anything by throwing spear after spear, moving in a circle to collect the thrown ones.

[Josiah Gibbonson]

16 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

If you're moving at all, it throws off your aim way too much.

That's why you always have six backup spears lol. Don't do it from a long distance, it's mostly only effective when something's chasing you 

[LadyWYT]

33 minutes ago, Josiah Gibbonson said:

That's why you always have six backup spears lol. Don't do it from a long distance, it's mostly only effective when something's chasing you 

I use spears for mid-long distance hunting, to make sure that the target either dies before it can get to me or is significantly weakened by the time it gets close. A sword is what I use for the dance of death, as I've found it much easier to wield in that circumstance than the spear.

For really long distances, the bow is king, though I still prefer the bow for ranged combat in general. More shots and it fires a bit faster, while being a bit easier to fire while moving as well.

42 minutes ago, Josiah Gibbonson said:

And if you do take thwm on, it's either going to be mind-numbingly brainless or you'll get no-scoped by thirteen dozen small rocks if you don't like...block yourself in. 

If there's a small army of enemies nearby, the general idea is not to wade into the middle of them to begin with...for most games, not just Vintage Story. It's also generally bad to let yourself get cornered by enemies, even if there's not very many of them, as it increases the chance of taking damage.

16 hours ago, Zer0pig316 said:

My opinion is actually that I don't want combat to be "fun". I want it to be scary, clumsy, frantic, and one-sided. I think the current, somewhat lackluster combat mechanics play well to this. Sure, I have mastered some of the strategies now and my current playthrough is at a point that the threats are not as dangerous but I remember my early encounters when I learned the wolves were no joke. A howl would stop me in my tracks or send me running. I miss that. The mobs in VS are not "enemies", they are environmental controls. They give me a reason to take shelter at night or have caution when I'm out too late. They add a risk factor to caving. They force me to have awareness of my surroundings when gathering resources or hunting. They check me when I am careless or too bold. They remind me that I am surviving in this world not the master of it. Every milestone toward mastery of the environment feels that much more satisfying because of it.

I mean, that's realistic combat in a nutshell. And depending on one's gaming preferences it can be fun; personally I find it fun in Vintage Story for the reasons you listed, especially the "environmental hazard" bit. The random rift activity really threw me for a loop when I first started playing, as I could never be sure what was going to be out there in the dark, and it still keeps me on my toes to this day.

[Thorfinn]

16 hours ago, Josiah Gibbonson said:

What I meant by it is you just have like seven spears on you at any given time and spam throw them. After you throw one, it replaces the one you just threw with another one in your inventory. You can essentially overpower anything by throwing spear after spear, moving in a circle to collect the thrown ones.

I thought we were talking about Vintage Story?  Where inventory is at something of a premium. I try to get by with 1 spear, 2 if I know there are wolves or bears somewhere close to where I'm headed to get resources.

But, again, if that bothers you, stop knapping a little earlier. It's not like anyone forces you to use 7.

Edited April 13, 2025 by Thorfinn

[Josiah Gibbonson]

1 hour ago, Thorfinn said:

thought we were talking about Vintage Story?  Where inventory is at something of a premium. I try to get by with 1 spear, 2 if I know there are wolves or bears somewhere close to where I'm headed to get resources.

But, again, if that bothers you, stop knapping a little earlier. It's not like anyone forces you to use 7.

I just bring seven when I anticipate hunting or combat because in my personal opinion it's incredibly overpowered lol 

[Thorfinn]

47 minutes ago, Josiah Gibbonson said:

I just bring seven when I anticipate hunting or combat because in my personal opinion it's incredibly overpowered lol 

Revealed preference.

[Khornet]

This subject came up dozens of times since the game's inception and the answer will always be the same (until it actually happens): yes, we need a combat overhaul.
Vintage Story is a survival game. HARD emphasis on the word "survival": it's everywhere in the game's description, including this very website's main page. What could be possibly more linked to the act of "surviving" than fighting for your life against wildlife or eldritch monstrosities?? To claim combat is "unimportant" for the game overall is something I always viewed as ridiculous. It should be one of, if not THE most polished and engaging gameplay mechanics.

Instead, it just... sucks.

Melee: you left click to swing your weapon (only 2 types) and basically keep poking things to death before they can slamdunk you into "Congratulations, you died!". It feels weak, it sounds weak, and it turns into a chore real quick.
Ranged is arguably better and slightly more fun because there is aiming involved. So it's less of a mindless spam, although still spam, because the "keep poking" thing still applies.

The knockback is gimmicky/buggy. Enemies can push you "away" just enough so that your attack doesn't land on them mid-animation. You can get blasted 10 metres into the air by a high tier attack DESPITE wearing a full set of steel armor. God have mercy on you if a bellhead shiver smacks you mid-air and you're near a lava pool in some deep caves.
All body hits are percentage-based. In a game where you have a base 15 HP and enemies hit for 24 damage, relying on 80% odds that they won't instagib you is NOT an option. This means that waring a full set of armor (helmet-chest-legs) is MANDATORY. So why split the armor into 3 pieces making it tedious to re-equip them CONSTANTLY? Why introduce a night-vision helmet if it REPLACES an actual helmet and thus I will NEVER EVER EVER use it because I'm at a 20% risk of dying instantly?
Which also brings me to the "armor increases your hunger rate AND reduces your healing" mechanic, which further increases the tedium. "Buh buh buh it's realistic that way!!" Bruh. You know what's NOT realistic? Re-equipping a full set of steel plate armor in a single second. And, like I said, you HAVE to do this in VS CONSTANTLY if you don't want to die from 1 hit. Or if you simply want to heal.

Enemy spawns are RIDICULOUS. Perhaps not as much on the surface, because these are trash mobs and their spawning is localized around rifts.
But if you go mining in the deep you are STUCK fighting CHAIN-RESPAWNS of high-tier enemies, FOREVER, they just keep doing that thing from the hit Smash Mouth song featured in the movie Shrek, and now that some of them are SNIPERS WITH IMMACULATE AIM THAT RUN AWAY FROM YOU it's all the more tedious and frustrating to deal with them.
Also, they don't make any footstep noises and can very easily sneak up and jumpscare you. Once again - God have mercy on you if a tier 5 shiver does that while you're trying to heal up (without your armor, because you need to take it off to heal properly). 

Healing sucks. Horsetail remains to have no actual medical properties in real life. Healing shouldn't be instant with poultices. Your health should regenerate faster at the price of draining hunger. Alchemy update remains benched on the development glacier.
Classes suck. They all have really simple/arbitrary and often useless effects. They're not fun. They just serve as an arbitrary ways to "unlock" certain crafting recipes, rather than being game-changers in your playstyle, which includes combat of course. It's as if they were introduced in a "work in progress" state and just left there, forgotten, until "mods fix it" started to be seen as the acceptable solution.

As for improving the raw combat mechanics themselves: I personally don't think dodge-rolling or melee combos or anything fancy like that is absolutely necessary. It can be better while still being simple at its core. What I feel like is necessary is a functional and fluid hitbox-based hit/block system (that means "aiming for the head on enemies" becomes an actual thing), a way to "hold" your swings, potentially for stronger attacks. I also think the game could benefit from a stamina system, linked to sprinting/jumping. Stamina drains/detriments could replace the hunger/healing/movement speed detriments for a less tedious combat experience.

Damage types would be nice, and I think game code already implies this is going to happen (IIRC shivers deal "slashing" damage according to code terminology). 

Different wound types with different healing methods for some extra emphasis on survival (so bandages for lacerations, poultices for bruises etc.) are a far, far away distant dream of mine to see in this game, somewhere next to avian fauna and a tree rework...

Edited April 15, 2025 by Khornet

[QueenGeeBee]

Im very simple.

I just want to Devil May Cry style on some drifters with a big sword and combo strings.

[BS3]

Honestly, after the animation change for the "Combat", I lost interest in playing this game.
I don't know why but every update, the game just gets more bug and less charming..

- New animation is frustrating to look at cause it blocks the view too much(especially the shield)
- The animation before was at least kinda crisp. I really liked the hoeing the ground with hoe and pouring the molten iron animation, now it's all janked.
- Cutting grass with knife is annoying cause you always end up cutting the grass and it plays stabbing animation instead of cutting animation if you aim little bit wrong.
- Wolf used to look fearsome and ran like it meant to end your life, now they run like cute little puppy.(Also their ai seems to act less hostile)

- Animals just drags down into the water when they run away(bug)
- I don't know if this is bug, but the night was so bright one day like I didn't even needed torch(bug?)

Honestly I don't know what devs are planning on combat cause this is not a Dark Souls game. We are fighting a slow, stupid drifters. What depth can dev make on combat? Seriously.
Was sacrificing the old animation this worth it?

[Thorfinn]

They may change their minds, but  combat overhaul is not currently on the roadmap. There are several things that are WIP that I think will get fleshed out, like damage types

Personally, I think it's absurd to think you could deal damage to an eldritch monster unless you were wielding some special cold-wrought iron or silver weapon,  Your regular old iron and steel should be fine for regular things like bears (and they are), but to temporal foes, I see nothing wrong with them treating your mundane armors as if you were nekkid. Maybe that's a good niche for meteoric or silver, I don't know. But that would at least be consistent with fantasy literature about eldritch foes.

Back when it was explicitly Lovecraftian, it would be absurd to think one could go toe-to-toe with an Old One, "survival" game or no.. Survival means giving Elder Things a wide berth, not grabbing a spatula and engaging them.

@BS3, welcome to the forums. You can adjust the view in game options. Hands position or something like that. Put it as low as you like. Agree lighting is weird.  Personally, I think it would be better if the game started on a full moon (but maybe not as bright as it now is) so you have a chance if you didn't make a torch that first day. Let the new moon fall in the middle of the month, when you've had a few days of increasingly dark nights to make you realize you need to do something about the night..

[TeaJay]

I would be nice if the combat was a bit more varied. Maybe like a second attack for each weapon? Spear could have a sweeping attack so it'd be a good weapon dealing with multiple enemies. Shield could have a bash that stuns enemies. Falx maybe a sweep also.

[Raelyn]

My input on combat in VS, taking into context it is a similar blockish game like MC and my very extensive varied gaming history (What I have seen work and not work in other forms)

Obviously in keeping with the hardcore theme of the game compared to MC, I think the combat should potentially reflect this a little bit. 

Add not a roll button, but maybe a side step so combat can be more dynamic and not simply "stand in hole and poke with long stick" because as it is, it's almost impossible to dodge in any meaningful way a wolf, bear or a ram. Trying to dodge a ram with a timed jump saw me launched off the mountain because he still somehow made contact.

Make using the shield similar to MC Java, currently as it is, the shield works like in bedrock and I'm not a fan at all. 

The spear and the falx are the only weapons I've used, so I'm not sure if there is one that does any kind of sweeping damage but there should be, it would be nice to have various styles of combat to choose from, although most classes seem to debuff melee sadly. 

[Raelyn]

15 hours ago, Thorfinn said:

Personally, I think it's absurd to think you could deal damage to an eldritch monster unless you were wielding some special cold-wrought iron or silver weapon,  Your regular old iron and steel should be fine for regular things like bears (and they are), but to temporal foes, I see nothing wrong with them treating your mundane armors as if you were nekkid. Maybe that's a good niche for meteoric or silver, I don't know. But that would at least be consistent with fantasy literature about eldritch foes.

Back when it was explicitly Lovecraftian, it would be absurd to think one could go toe-to-toe with an Old One, "survival" game or no.. Survival means giving Elder Things a wide berth, not grabbing a spatula and engaging them.

As long as it doesn't apply to drifters or the more common spawning mobs or they fix the spawning. I don't think many people would like be absolutely helpless against them at night for quite some time. Been playing for a week on a server and we are barely getting a handle on bronze. Some people sleep through the night, but I tend to avoid it because it uses up my hunger even if I had a full bar. I also don't mind working through the night if I have light. I use day for hunting/exploring, but I can't do that if I have drifters spawning but lack the resources/ores to make a magical weapon to even dispatch those low tier enemies, and don't even get me started on armors, we are nowhere near being able to make any consistently. The leathermaking process is kicking our ass. 

 

 

[Thorfinn]

9 hours ago, Raelyn said:

As long as it doesn't apply to drifters or the more common spawning mobs or they fix the spawning. I don't think many people would like be absolutely helpless against them at night for quite some time.

Sure. I'm thinking more like standard RPG fare. The lower level critters are more vulnerable, many even to bog-standard weapons. Garlic repels vampires, wolfsbane repels lycanthropes, etc.

The surface varieties should be vulnerable to everything, and I'd even include the Deeps because they sometimes appear on the surface.t, but as you take on the higher level versions of the critters you need increasingly good weaponry. Or maybe lesser weaponry does half damage or something. Does mean the dynamic for storms might have to change some -- early storms have few to no nightmare+, since you would have to run away from them anyway.

[Big Bad]

On 3/30/2025 at 9:50 AM, Krähenwolf said:

Dual wielding could be fine, but being a medieval history nerd myself, it would only make sense to me if daggers were also introduced. Dual wielding was basically almost only done with a shorter weapon than your main weapon, because of the logistics - you needed to hit an opponent from two directions at the same time, and two equally long weapons just got in the way. Blocking, however, could be improved, though for the points made above.

Maybe there could be weapons dedicated to being used in the off-hand, like a parrying dagger or sickle?

On the wider topic of the off-hand, I'd like to option to hang a lantern on a belt so I can have both light and the ability to hold a shield/tongs/whatever