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

[Diff]

This is a forum for discussion, if you don't want to discuss, the best solution is to not engage. If you want to express your own thoughts without having to argue them (which is exhausting for all when you once again reveal yourself to be "immutable"), maybe you could make the first Vintage Story fan blog.

On 12/26/2025 at 3:37 PM, Teslov said:

Man, people have so many ideas for all the new grand mechanics and stuff and here I am just wishing animals stopped sliding around at mach 7 up and down a hill and enemies clipping through you and bugging out while you can't hit them as they spin like a windmill...

Sure, when everything works as expected the current combat is simple and easy, but we need some clunk reduction, no?
Even without any new mechanics.

Rewinding a bit, I agree a lot with this. While I think there's some opportunities for improving the mechanics, I think what we have already would be a lot better if just polished a little more.

Beyond that, I also think things would be more interesting with less direct combat overall. I think this has already all been said, but combat in survival's pretty rare, and very deadly. If you get a fight with a bear or a wolf, you just lose. I think VS already has that down pretty well. Prey animals are all faster than you are, so the only way you'll catch them is by ambushing, trapping, or by exhausting them over a long period of time. Right now the animals are simultaneously too predictable for a combat focus, but they don't have enough internal state to make them predictable enough for things like trapping and ambushing to not have to rely on just sword-swinging to bring home a meal.

[Bumber]

6 hours ago, Diff said:

the same batch of bugs and broken assumptions could also cause trains to be less fun and usable when they unexpectedly launch themselves into orbit.

Seraph Space Program

[LadyWYT]

1 hour ago, Bumber said:

Seraph Space Program

I'm pretty sure that already exists, given a certain tale told in the funny story thread by @ifoz.

 

4 hours ago, Diff said:

Beyond that, I also think things would be more interesting with less direct combat overall. I think this has already all been said, but combat in survival's pretty rare, and very deadly. If you get a fight with a bear or a wolf, you just lose. I think VS already has that down pretty well. Prey animals are all faster than you are, so the only way you'll catch them is by ambushing, trapping, or by exhausting them over a long period of time. Right now the animals are simultaneously too predictable for a combat focus, but they don't have enough internal state to make them predictable enough for things like trapping and ambushing to not have to rely on just sword-swinging to bring home a meal.

For bears, I'd wager they could add behavior similar to how Red Dead 2 handled it: player inaction qualifies as asserting dominance and the bear will just leave. Most players, when they see a bear in a videogame(and the bear is clearly being aggressive), will panic and either attack or run, since generally enemies are coded to fight the player and nothing else. As a result, the bear will still pose a significant threat in most cases, but it does give the player an alternative to use, if they are aware that it exists.

Prey animals...I dunno, those feel like they're in a weird spot. I don't think the player should be able to one shot larger animals, as that makes acquiring certain resources too easy and reduces incentive for acquiring livestock, but neither should the prey animals be too aggressive either. Overall, I think the prey animals(like sheep and pigs) should try a little harder to avoid the player, with the potential to get more aggressive if the player insists on getting too close. Currently, it's very easy to just walk right up to them and bonk them over the head for an easy meal.

[clevermagpie]

I think the combat in the base game is definitely not especially good.

The weapons are limited, there's very little moment-to-moment decision making depth beyond very basic, outdated means to exploit ai/mechanics, the way the combat relates back to the other mechanics of the game are there but a little bare-bones imo, and there's little to facilitate individual fantasy or skill expression.
But I also think most people seeking a game like this aren't really expecting particularly good/deep combat, so you probably wouldn't consider that a great issue unless you meant to judge each feature of the game as equally important. It's easy to play this game without fighting much at all! That said, some design decisions (temporal storms, rifts, etc,) do make it seem like the game wants you to engage with action more often than others of its ilk.
...which in my opinion is a risky choice since the combat mechanics are pretty bare bones! haha

I think the ways the average end-user imagines these problems should be solved (dual-wielding, for example) probably wouldn't do the trick; the things that make combat feel good are usually more elemental than new features/gimmicks. They tend to have to do with the depth present in the very basic model of combat, that then has complexity added on top of that foundation.

I doubt very much that the VS team/direction is interested in that kinda thing though, personally!

If they were, I would hope they take influence from successful 1st person combat games like Vermintide, Avowed, Mount+Blade (to a lesser extent,) KCD, and so on. Not necessarily to directly ape the systems in those games (which are much more focused on being good combat games,) but instead to draw inspiration from sources that were successful at the task of making good combat in first person.
There are some features that are pretty standard these days; input-based blocking, one or two methods of attack (light/strong, standard/alternate, whatev,) enemies that incentivize or reward diverse usage of those tools, enemies that present strategic challenges beyond either shooting from a distances or swarming the player, etc., different reasons to use different weapons, or to specialize, etc., that would all be great things for/sings of, a good or in-depth combat system.

I think the main issues would probably come down to how they'd fit in an open world block game, how something like that would hold up in multiplayer, how the team would actually make and implement anything like that, and most importantly whether they even cared to, etc etc,

Combat is one of the harder things to make good in video games as far as I understand it, takes time and effort that I imagine people who were inspired primarily by minecraft might be less interested in than saaaay; another cool way to interface with the world visa vi crafting/building/gathering/etc!

To me it seems unlikely, anyway. 

-

edit: to be clear, as a blackguard player, I definitely definitely definitely wish they would/want them to make combat better!!! I just don't think they will.

Edited December 29, 2025 by clevermagpie
adding context of my actual opinion

[QueenGeeBee]

So elegantly put, I fully agree with Clevermagpie's summary.

I do think that at the very least, the game could do with implimenting more weapons to the pool. I dont think we'll get a full rework to combat, but even adding some variety to how people could engage with it would be a good start.

I feel like the way to incentivize using different weapons would be making enemies weak to certain damage types like crushing, piercing, slashing, that kinda thing, but the pool of enemies might be a bit limited to pull that off in a way thats easy to understand without seeming arbitrary

[LadyWYT]

23 minutes ago, QueenGeeBee said:

I do think that at the very least, the game could do with implimenting more weapons to the pool. I dont think we'll get a full rework to combat, but even adding some variety to how people could engage with it would be a good start.

Agreed. The only thing I would add here is that the falx should remain the prime choice for monster fighting, as it's specifically described as designed to battle the unnatural(which normal weapons fail to do well). The autoloot feature gives it a good advantage in that regard.

 

25 minutes ago, QueenGeeBee said:

I feel like the way to incentivize using different weapons would be making enemies weak to certain damage types like crushing, piercing, slashing, that kinda thing, but the pool of enemies might be a bit limited to pull that off in a way thats easy to understand without seeming arbitrary

Maybe. There's somewhat of a framework for that kind of thing in place, since fire will do fire damage and stones count as blunt damage, but I'm not sure that damage type is actually accounted for in the damage calculations. The main drawback I see to a system like this is that it can easily turn the combat system from one that's easy to jump right into and start having fun, to one that requires the player to study intently if they want to actually see any success in combat.

Personally, I enjoy the rock/paper/scissors challenge of different damage types, however, when it comes to what should be vanilla I'd prefer the simpler system. My reasoning for that choice is that with the simpler system, it's much easier for new players(or players that took an extended break) to jump right into the game and have decent success handling themselves on that front, without needing to look up guides or exhaustively study the handbook weighing their different weapon/armor choices. That doesn't mean that combat should be easy, but rather that the handbook studying should be left to other gameplay loops.

I think if nothing else, rather than different damage types, you could probably utilize a status effect system and just allow different weapons to inflict different effects instead. For example, swords could have a chance to inflict bleeding wounds, while a blunt weapon is more likely to break bones or stun an opponent. Armor like gambeson could protect from bleed effects only, while plate could resist bleeds as well as broken bones/stuns(making it a more attractive choice in spite of its drawbacks). The overall combat remains fairly simple, while still adding some nuance to weapon and armor choices.

[MKMoose]

On 12/29/2025 at 1:01 AM, clevermagpie said:

I doubt very much that the VS team/direction is interested in that kinda thing though, personally!

Tyron has said in an interview that while they're aware of the player sentiment around combat, they don't really have the time and experience that a proper combat rework would take and so it's a low priority for them, or something to that effect. The team that is developing Project Glint will be focusing on combat more, and VS might benefit from it by proxy in some capacity, but there's no telling when that might be and what it will exactly entail.

 

On 12/29/2025 at 1:01 AM, clevermagpie said:

I think the ways the average end-user imagines these problems should be solved (dual-wielding, for example) probably wouldn't do the trick; the things that make combat feel good are usually more elemental than new features/gimmicks. They tend to have to do with the depth present in the very basic model of combat, that then has complexity added on top of that foundation.

I don't know whether there is any sort of consensus in the wider community, beyond the common sentiment that combat should be improved sooner or later. I have seen a whole bunch of different suggestions, and I do have to say that while some can be rather misguided, there's a lot of good ideas as well across these forums and elsewhere.

A few areas for improvements that are more systemic in nature which I've seen brought up include:

• weapon hitboxes and animations - the current system is basically point-and-click in many ways, and it still manages to be janky at times,
• entity hitboxes - very simplistic at the moment, certain weakpoints would be cool,
• knockback and enemy i-frames - currently underdeveloped and in some cases more annoying than useful; stagger and slowdown effects would be often better than having enemies jump when hit,
• line of sight - could be especially important for hunting,
• status effects - could give more weight to injuries, make armor into something more than damage resistance, and increase variety of medical items,
• remove omnidirectional sprint (or at least make it slower when running backwards), add movement momentum - current movement allows all the freedom and has zero restrictions, which can be nice for creative building but isn't conducive to weighty and satisfying combat; could try making movement less responsive only as a sort of combat exhaustion mechanic, to have less effect on casual walking around but kick in after waving a weapon around for a while.

 

On 12/29/2025 at 1:01 AM, clevermagpie said:

I would hope they take influence from successful 1st person combat games like Vermintide, Avowed, Mount+Blade (to a lesser extent,) KCD, and so on. Not necessarily to directly ape the systems in those games (which are much more focused on being good combat games,) but instead to draw inspiration from sources that were successful at the task of making good combat in first person.
There are some features that are pretty standard these days; input-based blocking, one or two methods of attack (light/strong, standard/alternate, whatev,) enemies that incentivize or reward diverse usage of those tools, enemies that present strategic challenges beyond either shooting from a distances or swarming the player, etc., different reasons to use different weapons, or to specialize, etc., that would all be great things for/sings of, a good or in-depth combat system.

Personally, I especially like Vermintide's combat system. It's relatively simple as it's built from a couple of basic mechanics that interact with each other in very natural ways and create a lot of depth when faced with the large variety of weapons and enemies. Granted, Vermintide is built with horde combat in mind, but I think there's a lot of things that could be adapted from it into VS to great benefit.

 

52 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

I think if nothing else, rather than different damage types, you could probably utilize a status effect system and just allow different weapons to inflict different effects instead. For example, swords could have a chance to inflict bleeding wounds, while a blunt weapon is more likely to break bones or stun an opponent. Armor like gambeson could protect from bleed effects only, while plate could resist bleeds as well as broken bones/stuns(making it a more attractive choice in spite of its drawbacks). The overall combat remains fairly simple, while still adding some nuance to weapon and armor choices.

I feel like the two tend to achieve roughly the same effect with little difference for the average player, though I do agree that exposing the information through weapons would likely be more accessible. Damage types can be better for some special interactions because they allow entities to define how they react to different weapon categories, e.g. disabling bowtorn's shooting by cutting their string things using slashing damage, or cracking a bell to weaken the effect of their ringing using a blunt attack.

 

If I were to pitch a list of features beyond the low-level changes I've mentioned above, I would focus on opening up the number of options in a way that favors different weapons in different circumstances (i.e. depending on number of enemies, types of enemies) and opens up alternative problem-solving methods. It would probably go something like this:

1. More varied attack speed, stagger/knockback strength and attack hitboxes - all three of these would open up the space for much greater variety of melee weapons with different strengths and weaknesses; there's too many ideas for changes to existing weapons and for new weapons to concisely list them all, but I would focus on a sword, axe, spear, mace, and falx.
2. A shove action to push away an enemy (alternatively a more involved blocking mechanic, not just with a shield), and perhaps similar special secondary actions for two-handed weapons in place of the shove - greatly enhances moment-to-moment decision-making by permitting an offensive (attack) or defensive (shove) action at any given moment.
3. Utility items that can be used in main hand as well as in off-hand (potentially replacing the aforementioned shove action when in off-hand), like shield bash, knife jab, wave a torch to scare off a threat, maybe throw a fistful of sand or quicklime for a stronger incapacitating effect - similarly to a shove action, greatly enhances the depth of different combat options and provides some ways to avoid combat in certain scenarios that don't just involve building a dirt wall.
4. Additionally, rework the scrap bomb into an actual throwable and add a noisemaker device in a similar vein - same reasoning as the previous point.
5. There's as always the suggestion to add crossbows, early firearms, and also better projectiles for the sling, though it's mostly separate from the discussion about melee combat. 
6. It may also be worth making a bunch changes to enemies and armor, but that is highly dependent on what other changes are made, e.g. damage types would encourage certain changes to armor, multi-hit weapons, shove action and stunning weapons may require enemies to be made more threatening, status effects and long-term injuries would require heavy balancing changes across the board.

Edited December 30, 2025 by MKMoose
Note on ranged combat, clarify reasoning, slightly rephrase a few things.

[Thorfinn]

Probably rather predictably, I couldn't care less about "improving" combat at the moment. Someday? Maybe. But if the game morphs into a combat game, especially a PvP game, it loses it's niche and becomes another "me, too" offering. This game is largely about building a homestead, and it's dishonest to claim that building a homestead does not require exploration for materials. The only way to avoid it is by playing in creative, which is obviously not the kind of gameplay people are seeking, or they would just "/GM 2"

Combat in the game is mostly something to be avoided. That should have been obvious from the loot drops. More weapons are likely in the offing. Those with a hankering for trying out a different skin could easily do so simply by modding the durability stats so that they last more than one combat. But that's not all that big of a deal. There's no real RPS or anything else to distinguish the weapons until status effects are implemented.

Which means this whole discussion is silly because it's premature. There's absolutely no way to know whether a suggestion is a good one or not without knowing what systems it needs to mesh with.

Re: tech debt, if you spend any time with the code, you know that's what they are trying to avoid. Adding 100 weapons and crappy, interim code to support it would be creating tech debt, and, obviously, that is not what the team is doing. All the in-game "diversity" are simply reskins with some parameter tweaking.

[clevermagpie]

19 hours ago, MKMoose said:

I don't know whether there is any sort of consensus in the wider community, beyond the common sentiment that combat should be improved sooner or later. I have seen a whole bunch of different suggestions, and I do have to say that while some can be rather misguided, there's a lot of good ideas as well across these forums and elsewhere.

I didn't mean to imply that no end-user could have a good idea of course; I suppose I meant more that end-users are at a disadvantage for making effective suggestions thanks to how the construction of games/game-design goes and how much of it is constrained/contingent on details/broader limitations. Then also the thing I said about base mechanics vs features, blah blah.

19 hours ago, MKMoose said:

• remove omnidirectional sprint (or at least make it slower when running backwards), add movement momentum - current movement allows all the freedom and has zero restrictions, which can be nice for creative building but isn't conducive to weighty and satisfying combat; could try making movement less responsive only as a sort of combat exhaustion mechanic, to have less effect on casual walking around but kick in after waving a weapon around for a while.

So I think inside this bullet is a really really important point which is that any improvements or overhauls to the combat have to exist inside Vintage Story, an open-world block game with a focus on exploration, gathering, processing, building, and survival. 

I think it seems obvious to us to go "oh, well, just have a mechanic that kicks in during combat/as an effect of combat," but due to the nature of the game that might not be the simplest thing, and it also might not even be necessary. Some of that comes down to opinion, I'm of the mind that mechanics should be consistent in a way that's situation-agnostic in an open-world game, I'm sure some people might disagree.

19 hours ago, MKMoose said:

Tyron has said in an interview that while they're aware of the player sentiment around combat, they don't really have the time and experience that a proper combat rework would take and so it's a low priority for them, or something to that effect. The team that is developing Project Glint will be focusing on combat more, and VS might benefit from it by proxy in some capacity, but there's no telling when that might be and what it will exactly entail.

I'm skeptical of that, to be honest. Leaders/faces of game projects trend on the affirmative and I think that the phrase "low priority" is very meaningful in the context of us really seeing any meaningful official combat overhauls/changes for VS. I don't know anything about this other project they've started either although I'm not necessarily thrilled to hear that, personally haha. 

I guess if this other project is using a similar base of construction (Mine...craft?? I don't actually know that much about the construction of VS) then they could move tech over from it to VS but idk about that honestly. I feel like studios say stuff like that all the time "new project y will benefit old project x!" with very few situations I can remember in my game-consumption tenure that actually follow through with that notion lol.

 

My official stance is: "Yes, the combat isn't particularly good or well-realized. No, I would not anticipate that changing in the practical future. Yes, I would advise seeking modding breakthroughs on that front. No, I would not think it likely that those mods would get integrated."

[LadyWYT]

1 hour ago, clevermagpie said:

I guess if this other project is using a similar base of construction (Mine...craft?? I don't actually know that much about the construction of VS) then they could move tech over from it to VS but idk about that honestly. I feel like studios say stuff like that all the time "new project y will benefit old project x!" with very few situations I can remember in my game-consumption tenure that actually follow through with that notion lol.

Both Vintage Story and Project Glint are being built off the same game engine, which to my knowledge is something custom-built by Anego Studios. So it's easier to copy/paste code from one game to another, with a few tweaks to make sure that said code is integrated well, of course.

What that means in terms of development choices though, I don't know. My best guess is that the devs could look at what concepts are working well in Project Glint, and then tweak them a bit to fit Vintage Story, and vice versa. Procedural dungeons and combat are a good example: to my knowledge, Project Glint is supposed to be much more of an RPG-dungeon crawler type game, so those are two important systems that will probably have development priority. Vintage Story is much more focused on exploration and homesteading, so it's more efficient to let the VS team focus on that and borrow from the PG team as needed. Same goes for potential survival mechanics and building in Project Glint--the VS team has done most of the heavy lifting there, so the PG team can take some of what works in VS and apply it to Project Glint.

2 hours ago, clevermagpie said:

My official stance is: "Yes, the combat isn't particularly good or well-realized. No, I would not anticipate that changing in the practical future. Yes, I would advise seeking modding breakthroughs on that front. No, I would not think it likely that those mods would get integrated."

You never know. Mods are a great way to test various ideas, and it's not unheard of for the devs to integrate well-executed mod concepts, provided that said concepts fit the developer vision. 

For combat specifically though, I think complex combat is better left to mods in most cases, especially when it comes to PvP balancing. That in itself is a nightmare, as it seems there's always stuff that is "too strong", or "too weak", or "the meta is boring and needs to change". What stuff that is varies from player to player. Additionally, balancing the classes would be a nightmare, as what's ideal for PvP doesn't usually work well for what works in PvE content. Of the classes we have, currently there's only two that really work for PvP(in my opinion), and that is Blackguard and Hunter. PvP typically has more variety in terms of class choice, but if more PvP classes were added then what happens is the class list starts getting bloated, with classes that start feeling the same due to overlaps and classes that feel too underwhelming in standard gameplay since they're balanced exclusively for PvP.

There's also the nightmare of balancing damage, as if melee is too strong then ranged players will complain, and vice versa. That's also an aspect that directly affects PvE as well, since if there's an option that's clearly better than the others(or perceived as such, anyway) then players will tend to pick that option.

Aside from all the above, the other main reason I think mods are better suited for PvP stuff is that mods allow the server owners to tailor the PvP balance to their specific liking. One server can buff ranged damage if they think it's too weak, while another server can easily nerf ranged damage if they feel it's too strong. If a server wants to throw magic into the mix for a high fantasy setting, they can easily do that while servers that prefer a more realistic approach could focus on historical arms/armament and balancing. Basically with mods, everyone can have what they want, as long as they're willing to do a little extra legwork with the initial setup.

21 hours ago, MKMoose said:

remove omnidirectional sprint (or at least make it slower when running backwards), add movement momentum - current movement allows all the freedom and has zero restrictions, which can be nice for creative building but isn't conducive to weighty and satisfying combat; could try making movement less responsive only as a sort of combat exhaustion mechanic, to have less effect on casual walking around but kick in after waving a weapon around for a while.

I wouldn't be opposed to this, as it does feel just a little too easy to throw yourself into reverse. I don't know that I'd want momentum based movement explicitly though, as I like being able to stop on a dime if I'm about to fall in a hole. But slowing down backwards movement feels fitting, and it's not a change that I would expect to hurt building at all. In creative mode, the restriction could be lifted, but in survival it would help prevent the player from backing up too quickly and falling off their build as a result.

If you've not tried it, I would recommend taking a look at the Vigor mod. Essentially, it adds a proper "stamina" bar to the game, which limits the duration that the player can sprint(better nutrition will increase stamina). Such a limit means that the player needs to be more careful about exactly when they choose to sprint, as low stamina at a critical moment can be deadly. It also gives much more value to having a mount, since the mount can run freely without such limits. It's another mechanic that I could easily see getting added to the vanilla game, since it adds quite a lot of nuance without actually changing too much.

[CastIronFabric]

9 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

Both Vintage Story and Project Glint are being built off the same game engine, which to my knowledge is something custom-built by Anego Studios. So it's easier to copy/paste code from one game to another, with a few tweaks to make sure that said code is integrated well, of course.

What that means in terms of development choices though, I don't know. My best guess is that the devs could look at what concepts are working well in Project Glint, and then tweak them a bit to fit Vintage Story, and vice versa. Procedural dungeons and combat are a good example: to my knowledge, Project Glint is supposed to be much more of an RPG-dungeon crawler type game, so those are two important systems that will probably have development priority. Vintage Story is much more focused on exploration and homesteading, so it's more efficient to let the VS team focus on that and borrow from the PG team as needed. Same goes for potential survival mechanics and building in Project Glint--the VS team has done most of the heavy lifting there, so the PG team can take some of what works in VS and apply it to Project Glint.

You never know. Mods are a great way to test various ideas, and it's not unheard of for the devs to integrate well-executed mod concepts, provided that said concepts fit the developer vision. 

For combat specifically though, I think complex combat is better left to mods in most cases, especially when it comes to PvP balancing. That in itself is a nightmare, as it seems there's always stuff that is "too strong", or "too weak", or "the meta is boring and needs to change". What stuff that is varies from player to player. Additionally, balancing the classes would be a nightmare, as what's ideal for PvP doesn't usually work well for what works in PvE content. Of the classes we have, currently there's only two that really work for PvP(in my opinion), and that is Blackguard and Hunter. PvP typically has more variety in terms of class choice, but if more PvP classes were added then what happens is the class list starts getting bloated, with classes that start feeling the same due to overlaps and classes that feel too underwhelming in standard gameplay since they're balanced exclusively for PvP.

There's also the nightmare of balancing damage, as if melee is too strong then ranged players will complain, and vice versa. That's also an aspect that directly affects PvE as well, since if there's an option that's clearly better than the others(or perceived as such, anyway) then players will tend to pick that option.

Aside from all the above, the other main reason I think mods are better suited for PvP stuff is that mods allow the server owners to tailor the PvP balance to their specific liking. One server can buff ranged damage if they think it's too weak, while another server can easily nerf ranged damage if they feel it's too strong. If a server wants to throw magic into the mix for a high fantasy setting, they can easily do that while servers that prefer a more realistic approach could focus on historical arms/armament and balancing. Basically with mods, everyone can have what they want, as long as they're willing to do a little extra legwork with the initial setup.

I wouldn't be opposed to this, as it does feel just a little too easy to throw yourself into reverse. I don't know that I'd want momentum based movement explicitly though, as I like being able to stop on a dime if I'm about to fall in a hole. But slowing down backwards movement feels fitting, and it's not a change that I would expect to hurt building at all. In creative mode, the restriction could be lifted, but in survival it would help prevent the player from backing up too quickly and falling off their build as a result.

If you've not tried it, I would recommend taking a look at the Vigor mod. Essentially, it adds a proper "stamina" bar to the game, which limits the duration that the player can sprint(better nutrition will increase stamina). Such a limit means that the player needs to be more careful about exactly when they choose to sprint, as low stamina at a critical moment can be deadly. It also gives much more value to having a mount, since the mount can run freely without such limits. It's another mechanic that I could easily see getting added to the vanilla game, since it adds quite a lot of nuance without actually changing too much.

fyi

from the news section.

 

Quote

Our goal is to create a novel voxel RPG experience that uses a blocky world as a platform for narrative, exploration and adventure. Project Glint won't be connected to Vintage Story, but it will use the same engine and we hope that the new tech and features we develop will ultimately benefit both games. Where Vintage Story is an uncompromising survival experience, Project Glint is intended to be more focused on RPG pillars like exploration, storytelling, and combat.

which to gloat, as I said a few months ago 'I bet its going to be heavier on the story'

That said from a historical perspective I do not agree that story telling is a pillar of RPG I do acknowledge that over the decades it has evolved as such. I am just stating this to be clear given past conversations.

I would like to point out that they are not describing Vintage Story as a narrative driven game but rather that this new one will be more so. Something to ponder over.

 

 

Edited December 31, 2025 by CastIronFabric

[Thorfinn]

1 hour ago, LadyWYT said:

You never know. Mods are a great way to test various ideas, and it's not unheard of for the devs to integrate well-executed mod concepts, provided that said concepts fit the developer vision. 

It's a bit more complicated in a for-profit venture of international scope because of copyright. The basic .json mod is one thing -- there are only a limited number of ways to manipulate existing key/values, so if push came to shove, the argument that this was something obvious, and not covered under copyright would probably hold up, at least in the States. (Though here we run into the possibility of a class action, where many mod developers would be added to the class despite their wishes.)  Many or even most of the code mods I've looked into have distinctive coding practices. It would have to be rewritten by Anego with the intent of making sure the resulting code was more like Anego code than the mod code. That can still be an issue in some places, and obviously, requires a court appearance with all the costs.

I think if I were in Anego's place, I'd stick with the current model, letting the modders develop and maintain the code, then, at release, buy it from each. Clear, unambiguous copyright transfer, and little to no distraction from the essentials on the roadmap.

[LadyWYT]

21 minutes ago, Thorfinn said:

It's a bit more complicated in a for-profit venture of international scope because of copyright. The basic .json mod is one thing -- there are only a limited number of ways to manipulate existing key/values, so if push came to shove, the argument that this was something obvious, and not covered under copyright would probably hold up, at least in the States. (Though here we run into the possibility of a class action, where many mod developers would be added to the class despite their wishes.)  Many or even most of the code mods I've looked into have distinctive coding practices. It would have to be rewritten by Anego with the intent of making sure the resulting code was more like Anego code than the mod code. That can still be an issue in some places, and obviously, requires a court appearance with all the costs.

I think if I were in Anego's place, I'd stick with the current model, letting the modders develop and maintain the code, then, at release, buy it from each. Clear, unambiguous copyright transfer, and little to no distraction from the essentials on the roadmap.

Oh yeah for sure, I was just stating it in overly simplified terms. 

[The Lerf]

I would love to see some slightly more involved combat, as pretty much every fight in the game boils down to "click this guy 3/4/5 times while running backward". If there were AI improvements to enemy behavior that were more than just "move to player position and melee attack", it would immediately feel so much better without any other changes. Right now, that describes how drifters, shivers, wolves, bears, boars, and goats attack the player, with Bowtorns being the lone exception to do something different, if not that interesting.

It's boring. And it doesn't feel very immersive to me, kiting around a pile of 10-15 drifters during a temporal storm, or even just a night of high rift activity. It makes every mob feel like a minecraft zombie. Sure, they're monsters, but I don't think I've ever interpreted them to be dumb horde fodder. 

This opens up the question, How should they act?

I would love to see loose formations, or attempts to circle around the player without necessarily attacking, just to split your focus and let something get behind you. Which is absolutely something that wolves should do. I would love if enemies stayed at arm's reach/melee range instead of attempting to occupy the same space I'm standing in. I'd like to see shivers climb up and hang off of walls to jump at you, or only attack when they have backup. Maybe bowtorns should actively seek high ground, or Drifters should move in groups but attack one or two at a time rather than 20 (like the Batman Arkham games), or shivers always spawn in pairs and try to attack from above. What if the torch got weapon functionality, as a way to scare away wolves and bears during the early game?

Some new mechanics? Enemies that do more than just deal damage. What if bowtorns fired much less frequently but their shots would leave a long trail of muscle sinew that would physically impede/slow the player unless you cut it with your falx? This turns the bowtorn into a kind of area denial enemy, which would be much more dangerous while in a cave than on the surface. It would also provide a way to track bowtorns down beyond the sound cue. What about an enemy that blurs your vision, or makes you drop your weapon? What if low-tier drifters were faster, and could tackle you to the ground so other drifters could get hits on you?

The combat in VS is simple to the point of being boring. You have slow enemy, fast enemy, and ranged enemy; and each one of them also has the opportunity to be high damage enemy. But if they can all be the high damage enemy, then fundamentally the differences don't really matter. There is no sandbox. It just makes your only strategy into 'Don't get hit'. I don't even bother with shields because they don't add anything to the combat system besides rolling dice to take damage, even if you're holding it up. The most effective tactic to fight anything is running backwards or pillaring. I'd like it to be better, I'd like to feel like wearing full iron/steel plate armor allows me to stand my ground a bit, and not just give me more room for mistakes while I kite drifters. But that begins with changes to enemy behavior before anything systemic like damage types and dodge rolls.

[CastIronFabric]

6 hours ago, The Lerf said:

I would love to see some slightly more involved combat, as pretty much every fight in the game boils down to "click this guy 3/4/5 times while running backward"

I am going to provide my immutable opinion on this subject matter. I am going to keep it short and because its short it might appear rude but its not, I am just trying to keep my opinion as concise and short as possible and again, my view on this is immutable. If I had said this too much in the past I will try to shut up about it if asked.

1. I do not think most players come to Vintage Story for a combat experience, vast majority of the features are related to building and crafting, 'its not ARMA 3' so to speak. That is not to suggest its a no-no to work on combat it just means there is an Opportunity Cost for every decision made and it makes sense to consider the audience when deciding on what to work on.

2. here is the quote regarding Project Glint 

Quote

We're excited to do something new with Project Glint. Our goal is to create a novel voxel RPG experience that uses a blocky world as a platform for narrative, exploration and adventure. Project Glint won't be connected to Vintage Story, but it will use the same engine and we hope that the new tech and features we develop will ultimately benefit both games. Where Vintage Story is an uncompromising survival experience, Project Glint is intended to be more focused on RPG pillars like exploration, storytelling, and combat.

It appears the studio does not see Vintage Story as combat being a major pillar, but the new project it will. I am not saying 'because they said so, it should be' I am just using this example to convey the point that I think they do see Vintage Story audience similar to how I do.

Thank you for listening.

 

[The Lerf]

Why do you think there's an opportunity cost involved for a game that's still in development? Is a feature that's implemented in it's basest form considered feature complete the moment it's added in an update, and if they continue to work on it that means we'll never get in-depth shoemaking?
"I don't think most players are coming to VS because they like riding elk. The vast majority of things in the game are meant to enhance the caving and underground experience. This isn't Barbie Horse Adventure, so I would expect the devs to keep adding more things to enhance caving." 
I don't think anyone is in this discussion desires VS to become a overdeveloped combat sim, so let's not try to imply that when someone suggests that a sword swing should behave differently from a club attack. When the game has you making farming decisions about soil based on how much nitrogen and potassium is left in it, I find it bothering that there are people who decry others who want that same level of granularity from other less-involved parts of the game. 

1 hour ago, CastIronFabric said:

I am going to provide my immutable opinion on this subject matter. 

If you aren't willing to consider any other opinions in this discussion other than your own, then why contribute? 

[CastIronFabric]

47 minutes ago, The Lerf said:

Why do you think there's an opportunity cost involved for a game that's still in development? Is a feature that's implemented in it's basest form considered feature complete the moment it's added in an update, and if they continue to work on it that means we'll never get in-depth shoemaking?
"I don't think most players are coming to VS because they like riding elk. The vast majority of things in the game are meant to enhance the caving and underground experience. This isn't Barbie Horse Adventure, so I would expect the devs to keep adding more things to enhance caving." 
I don't think anyone is in this discussion desires VS to become a overdeveloped combat sim, so let's not try to imply that when someone suggests that a sword swing should behave differently from a club attack. When the game has you making farming decisions about soil based on how much nitrogen and potassium is left in it, I find it bothering that there are people who decry others who want that same level of granularity from other less-involved parts of the game. 

If you aren't willing to consider any other opinions in this discussion other than your own, then why contribute? 

because I am sharing my view with other people but I am not interested in debating it. I do not think that as complicated, you know if you are in a car and someone says 'I like that restaurant', maybe they are not interested in having a debate over that but they are just letting people know nothing more. If everyone had to face a debate over any assertion they make people would never talk at all it would be exhausting having to explain in detail and debate over why you like a store (for example)

simple

now please accept that and just move on, please be kind enough to do so.

Edited January 1 by CastIronFabric

[Diff]

We're not idly driving by places in a car with no destination, this is a focused discussion on a single topic. It's not just an assertion either, when you try to support your random opinion by providing faulty reasoning, people are going to critique that faulty reasoning, because this is a discussion, and you engaged with it.

Edited January 1 by Diff

[The Lerf]

That's great man, you stated your opinion a few times, and you have no interest in changing it. I'd like to discuss with people on the deeper bits of "Why does clicking an enemy 5 times excite you, or not?" People share their opinions, and everyone learns a little bit about everyone else. Maybe body part specific damage doesn't feel like it fits vanilla VS, and someone can explain their reasoning for it, and someone else can go 'Wow! I never considered that, what if instead...," and we end up having a productive conversation about things that we like, or don't like. 

If you're bringing up that you like that restaurant, someone asking why isn't always a debate to be had. Maybe it's an attempt to connect and find out a mutual interest. Do they have good fries? Are the napkins soft? Do they embrace an equal opportunity workplace environment? But you're just providing a dead end to the conversation. And now I'll never know why that restaurant is good, or why you like it. And I'll have to ask you to leave my car because I'm not sure if we're compatible or not. It's not you, or me.

It's this brick wall you've built between us.

Edited January 1 by The Lerf

[LadyWYT]

The way I look at it is that it's perfectly fine to share an opinion without being willing to discuss it or otherwise have a change of mind. However, sharing said opinion on a public forum makes it fair game for discussion. Where it starts to really be a problem, is when said opinion is getting relentlessly shoved at other posters without any sort of counter-argument or willingness to discuss why it may/may not be a good idea.

23 minutes ago, The Lerf said:

People share their opinions, and everyone learns a little bit about everyone else. Maybe body part specific damage doesn't feel like it fits vanilla VS, and someone can explain their reasoning for it, and someone else can go 'Wow! I never considered that, what if instead...," and we end up having a productive conversation about things that we like, or don't like. 

Pretty much. I would say even some of the worst takes can be taken seriously, as long as the poster making them is open to polite(or at least, relatively civil) discussion with everyone else. Even in the event that no agreement is reached, there's at least a decent list of pros and cons about the different ideas.

 

1 hour ago, The Lerf said:

I don't think anyone is in this discussion desires VS to become a overdeveloped combat sim, so let's not try to imply that when someone suggests that a sword swing should behave differently from a club attack. When the game has you making farming decisions about soil based on how much nitrogen and potassium is left in it, I find it bothering that there are people who decry others who want that same level of granularity from other less-involved parts of the game. 

Just my two cents here, but in my experience it's not unusual for combat suggestions to tip the game into "combat simulator" territory, as Valheim and other games explicitly focused on combat often get cited as examples of what VS combat should be. Not all combat suggestions are like that, mind you, but many do seem to come from players who seem to want primarily combat and don't really care about the other things the game has to offer.

My general opinion on VS combat is that I would rather see small changes implemented first, like a status effect system and herbalism(poisons) as well as some hitbox/animation tuning, and see how those changes affect the overall balance before resorting to more drastic measures like reworking the entire system from the ground up. The simpler "point and click" system we have now also makes it very easy to jump right into the game and start playing decently well, regardless of whether the player is brand new or a veteran that just hasn't played in a while. However, there's also enough nuance that the player can still tailor their equipment to better fit their given situation; that is, plate armor is good for base defense, but not for adventuring. Gambeson is great for adventuring, but not so good for venturing deep underground. Spears do the most damage at range but bows can shoot farther and are more efficient on inventory space. It's not quite the other block game's kind of simple where the player just dons diamond/netherite, picks a weapon, and then calls it a day.

[The Lerf]

1 minute ago, LadyWYT said:

Just my two cents here, but in my experience it's not unusual for combat suggestions to tip the game into "combat simulator" territory, as Valheim and other games explicitly focused on combat often get cited as examples of what VS combat should be. Not all combat suggestions are like that, mind you, but many do seem to come from players who seem to want primarily combat and don't really care about the other things the game has to offer.

My general opinion on VS combat is that I would rather see small changes implemented first, like a status effect system and herbalism(poisons) as well as some hitbox/animation tuning, and see how those changes affect the overall balance before resorting to more drastic measures like reworking the entire system from the ground up. The simpler "point and click" system we have now also makes it very easy to jump right into the game and start playing decently well, regardless of whether the player is brand new or a veteran that just hasn't played in a while. However, there's also enough nuance that the player can still tailor their equipment to better fit their given situation; that is, plate armor is good for base defense, but not for adventuring. Gambeson is great for adventuring, but not so good for venturing deep underground. Spears do the most damage at range but bows can shoot farther and are more efficient on inventory space. It's not quite the other block game's kind of simple where the player just dons diamond/netherite, picks a weapon, and then calls it a day.

Oh I definitely agree, some posters are... overzealous with their ideas, but I understand it comes from a place of wanting to enjoy VS more. It's the challenge of dictating what is within the realm of vanilla, versus what's better left up to mods... and that's really only a decision that can be made by the devs. Players are all trying to interpret the future of their vision based on what we have in our hands, all based on our own personal tastes. It's the different interpretations of art and discussion surrounding it that really interests me, and I always wonder if they also expect the same level of commitment applied to things like making cheese or plank cutting.

I think a certain level of simplicity is expected in vanilla VS, and I don't see anything wrong with that. But with so many different systems and the game still under development, there is an inconsistency we currently face. I like the variation and choice between plate, mail, brig, and gambeson armors, along with the falx vs spear vs bow arms. Even the rust enemies as I said before have three distinct archetypes, slow vs fast vs ranged; but the systems where they interact with the player are too simple. They reduce player health by running at you via the shortest possible path (excluding bowtorn). And it's this area where I'd like to see more development work before I start to hope for more complicated combat features like dual wielding or stealth takedowns. Not to say that I am hoping for those, but you get what I mean. I want to see current systems all brought to a similar level of verisimilitude before committing to brand new ones, if that makes sense. I agree, and think that status effects like poison, blinding, and hallucination are within vanilla's 'feel', and can introduce some decision making and target priority during fights without feeling too complicated. Maybe we don't even need to overhaul the point-and-click combat if it feels right after adding. It's all up to dreams and developers, and thankfully they're pro-modding, but I just find something special about playing vanilla as someone's undiluted idea as art.

[QueenGeeBee]

2 hours ago, The Lerf said:

I don't think anyone is in this discussion desires VS to become a overdeveloped combat sim, so let's not try to imply that when someone suggests that a sword swing should behave differently from a club attack. When the game has you making farming decisions about soil based on how much nitrogen and potassium is left in it, I find it bothering that there are people who decry others who want that same level of granularity from other less-involved parts of the game. 

I couldnt agree more. Its just strange to me that some hold the opinion that the devs shouldnt touch up combat because its not the main focus, like thats an excuse to leave a system feeling bad. Its like saying 'I dont think a majority of players come to vintage story expecting tailoring to be good, so we should leave it exactly how it is and not change anything about it.' Or 'Making tailoring more complicated would just make players feel confused/excluded or keep them from engaging with other parts of the game.' Like we're not playing a game with vast mechanical depth in a lot of its systems.

I also dont agree with the argument that most players dont come to vintage story expecting complex combat mechanics. Clearly lots of people want good combat, theres been countless threads and posts and suggestions over combat for years. I want to have fun with good combat, and that doesnt make my desires for the game any less valid. Im sure people find fun in games like this in a lot of different ways, and there shouldnt be a argument that most everyone only enjoys one main aspect of it.

Combat should be changed to be both fun and rewarding to engage with. Spending time prospecting for ore, mining it, heating it into bars, then smithing it into a cool weapon should have a payoff of having a sick time using that cool weapon to fight monsters, but rewards are completely not worth it, and combat boils down to running backwards (because enemies try and occupy the same space as the player so you have to continuously run away or theyll clip into you and damage you) and clicking on enemies (because thats the only way to kill them and theres no inherent strategies. Anywhere you hit on an enemy does the same damage, all weapons work the exact same and have little difference besides autoloot vs throw spear, and the only reaction enemies give is they sometimes try to run at low hp) 

 

I just want to make steel tier clubs with the ability to stun enemies tbh. Maybe also give enemies better hitboxes and a weakspot so theres some gameplay to aiming where to hit. I dont think we need the world given to us, just enough to add more mechanical complexity so i can learn and master a system like how people can learn/master smithing.

[LadyWYT]

6 minutes ago, QueenGeeBee said:

just enough to add more mechanical complexity so i can learn and master a system like how people can learn/master smithing.

Speaking of smithing, it looks like we're going to be getting some proper tempering mechanics next update. While I don't expect to get new weapons, I think it'll make the weapons we currently have more interesting since the player can have some control over specific properties. A sword with more durability will last longer before it breaks, but make require an extra hit or two to kill an opponent since the softer metal can't hit as hard. A sword with a harder temper might do more damage and thus be more efficient at killing enemies, but that damage boost comes at the cost of the weapon having a lower durability.

[QueenGeeBee]

Unrelated, Threads hot wooo

Also, the new complexity with smithing mechanics is really cool. Cant wait to see how that plays out in terms of shaking up combat.

I hope they sneak rebalanced spears into the update so i can rock a steel lance and fight some monsters

[LadyWYT]

6 minutes ago, QueenGeeBee said:

I hope they sneak rebalanced spears into the update so i can rock a steel lance and fight some monsters

Or just add iron/steel lances as a weapon separate from spears, and let it be a thing you either use like a proper lance while mounted(by the time you get iron/steel you can easily get a mount, outside of Homo Sapiens), or more like a pike on foot. That is, it's not a weapon that you either stab or throw, like the basic spear. I think that would give both weapons a good niche without either one overshadowing the other.