I’m not particularly worried about how combat might play out in KCD at this point. I know one of the demo videos was done with a longer fight to show the variety of positions that could be attacked and defended from. I would expect most swordfights to be over faster than that depending on how they’re handled by each player. If you run up against an enemy too good for you, it sounded like there would be a chance to improve before trying to go through him again.
The problem is not only the length of the fight itself but it’s style. It’s just not realistic without the inclusion of body physics (in the meaning of using your body as a wepaon in both offense and defense). Weapon physics are only part of the deal of realistic (sword) fighting.
Show or maybe tournament combat relies on continued parrying like seen in the video. Real combat in a real battle relies on killing as fast as possible by any means necessary.
You know, I think KCD is already way better than similar games in terms of realistic combat system and physics. But at the same time it’s also far away from reality. Right now it seems like an iteration of single, unconnected moves. Attack, parry, attack, parry, attack and so on until you finally break through. Real combat is in constant flow with connected movements of both body and weapon based on the very situation.
Maybe it’s better explained with a comparison to maths: show combat based on predefined iterative attacks is like discrete numbers while real combat based on a constant non-iterative situational movement is like continuous numbers.
And yes, I know that a really realistic combat system based on a continuous movement of both body and weapon with a wide variety of situational solutions and attacks is incredible difficult to implement in a video game to be controlled with a mouse/keyboard or a controller. It’s just something I dream about. 
Yeah, I’d be interested to see how realistic they can make what’s essentially unpredictable. Swordfights were not just about clashing swords and jabbing or slashing at openings. You had sword-catchers, you had people grabbing the blade to swing down with the handle sometimes, like a club. There are just a lot of variables compared to, say, a fencing match. I really have no idea how well that can be portrayed in a game.
Exactly. The problem is that real medieval fighting on a battlefield wasn’t about (show) fencing, not at all.
But as I said, it’s VERY difficult to make a non-predictable, non-iterative, non-predefined, completely dynamic melee fighting system based on real body and weapon physics. That’s probably the holy grail of the genre… 
That being said, fighting against fully armoured opponents was probably much more about martial arts than about fencing, at least for a professional soldier/knight. I think the game should reflect that at least somehow, maybe with special “body-based attacks” in battle (fist punches, martial art attacks, knocking with your head, certain throws, disarming moves). I think they would be a welcomed addition to the system currently in place, especially for “killing animations”.
I think about something like that, for example: you see a small opening in your opponents defense, use a special martial arts attack (probably learnt by levelling up) that breaks his balance and causes him to fall to the ground and kill him by stabbing your dagger through his visor or his axilla (once or multiple times). That would be one hell of a nice and realistic killing sequence, don’t ya think?.. 
It reminds me of a History Channel episode I watched called “Going Medieval.” The main reason I watched it was because it touched on some things related to hunting, but it also goes into some detail about various sword techniques and what knights were like.
The summary: “Diving deep into the life and times of the Middle Ages, historian and weapons expert Mike Loades hosts the two-hour H2 special, Going Medieval, delivering fun-filled facts such as how to keep a knight’s armor shiny using sand, vinegar and urine. Loades battles the myths vs. the realities of work and home during this extraordinary time.”
You know, some maybe don’t like to hear that, but combat in for example Assassin’s creed is way more realistic than in for example Skyrim and for example Dark Souls. I don’t talk about controls or gameplay here but about the execution and the display of fighting and killing.
The problem is the restriction of controllers and the limitations of development in general. QTEs seem to be a simple solution to offer a “more realistic display of combat” at generally rather low development skills and requirements but at the same time it’s probably not the best solution in terms of controls and freedom for the player. Ryse for example went down that route, even more than Assassin’s Creed. The problem with Ryse was that it’s combat system which heavily relied on QTEs offered way too little options and freedom for the player with way too much predefined actions.
I think the probably best solution atm might be the combination of real-time combat and QTE based elements with a lot of freedom and different options for the player. The system currently in place for KCD already seems to follow the same design. I think that QTEs aren’t bad in general but their actual execution in most games is rather bad. There is for example a great difference between showing indicators or not, at least for me. Showing a big X above the head in order to indicate that pressing X right now could kill an enemy at once is something that should imo be avoided. But at the same time you could integrate certain killing sequences based on actual player perception. Stuy the movements and try to find weaknesses in your opponents defense. If you think that you found on press X and see whether it pays out or not. I guess and hope KCD will feature something along these lines…
(Sorry for the off-topic but since it’s “my” thread I thought I could go a bit wild here…)
@Flashfire - For what it’s worth, in video update #4 for combat they say that pummel strikes will be part of combat. So they’re incorporating some additional aspects of combat. I agree with what you that it will be challenging to map everything in a game.
Excellent. With so much that’s been shown and talked about (which is not a bad thing) it’s easy to miss a brief mention of something like that.
if you want the “realistic”(the heck?) style in ass creed, enjoy qte button mashing.
any freedom in melee means you cannot have pre-defined animations that look cool, you have to have player agency.
that’s why kcd DOES NOT have ass creed style, they have kill moves that ACTIVATE when you do a certain action at a certain time under the right circumstance, it’s not qte, it’s more like looking and watching for the right time to strike through enemy defense, a big thing in medieval combat manuscripts. also, everything else is based on procedural animation via inverse kinematics and physical calculation of the weapon making contact.
the only pre-defined things are the various attacks and defensive moves. but with that selection of moves, using different angles(6) and the unpredictable nature of enemy attack angle, player and enemy physical placement in the game world, that provides a huge number of variables in combat with precision and realism of those historically inspired moves.
you don’t need clang’s gimmicky sword swining or ass creed’s “win” button qte, you just need good game design.
That’s exactly the basic definition of a QTE.
And Assassin’s Creed does exactly the same, at least on a very basic level. You could complain that it is too easy but that’s another topic…
“Just good game design” - you’re really funny, mate. There is a reason why games are developed in certain ways. If it would be that easy to make a fun game with realistic sword fighting, everyone would do it. Bethesda would do it, From Software would do it, CDPR would do it, probably each and every RPG studio out there would do it. But it seems that it isn’t so easy after all…
And please, could you use upper letters It’s not very enjoyable to discuss with you that way and it doesn’t show a lot of respect to your readers, you know. We’re not in a chatroom for kids here…
not really. qtes are programmed beforehand. they always transpire the same way, or under very limited variations. ie, if you skip or fail one step, you move onto the next scripted sequence.
with the way i understand kcd is doing it, it’s never going to be dictated by the story writer or scripted events, it’s going to happen if the player strikes at the right moment. no button mashing.
i liken it more to a critical hit with its special animation. it’s basically just a kill move. but no bullshit qte(from what i understand).
Ok, but in that case there are no QTEs in AC neither. At least not in combat, only for stuff like hunting like in AC III. As in KCD you only “break” the enemies defense if you hit the counter button at the right moment. If you fail to hit it the fight continues.
But I share your taste about combat for KCD. I think there should be a rather “free” system based on reap physics but with some deadly blows (with kill animations) if you hit at the right time and perhaps after weakening your opponent in battle. It’s probably a system between AC and Skyrim/Dark Souls, a mix of free combat and finishing moves. At least I would welcome such a system because it would be a compromise between nice and fluid gameplay and a quite realistic (visual) display of actual combat and killing.
Oof.
wow what a disaster. kickstarter really should have some policy or something, that guy even got gabe newell to show up in his pitch playing a black smith. how did that even happen?
The interesting comment in that kickstarter page to me is this:
Others are my responsibility in that I probably focused too much on historical accuracy and not enough on making it sufficiently fun to attract additional investment.
from https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/260688528/clang/posts/989911
Let’s hope that this project brings the thing that puts the “fun” in “funding” (or would that be the “funding” for "fun? hmmm)
Neal Stephenson - author of “SnowCrash”, “Cryptonomicon”, and “Anathema” (to name a few)
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I’d say trying for historical accuracy with an actual prop sword you swing around or whatever is likely to be pretty different from just making a normal game that attempts to be realistic and true to what’s known of the time period that’s selected.
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is he kidding? the tech demo they released was about as historical accurate as monty python’s holy grail. i think he simply underestimated the cost of developing such a game, and secondly, didn’t understand what such a concept simply isn’t very well though out. your sword collides in game, what will your physical counterpart collide with?
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Of course I knew! That’s how I got to KingdomCome.
I really liked the approach and think they achieved a lot. Unfortunately they focused too much on the technical side, which I personally viewed more of a good thing, but it drained the funding.
I really hope they either go on, restart or at least open source their knowledge.