Melee combat

[TheAphabet]

So basically all we need is more variety of combos with new system added.
like kick (bash but with a foot + "back off" further effect), run kick, drop kick that will stumble a zed, slide kick to knockdown a zed.... With i guess some stamina added to it, so you wouldn't just kick everything 24/7, but rather manage it and use it when you are fighting something bigger.

But that would require of making new animations and adding an additional input.

Also funny, is that with this addition... We are basically making something of a martial artist with those mechanical fists that we got recently as a weapon.

(kicks can also be added as a finishing move without incurring an additional input cuz... You know. Console players. Either that, or M1+M2 = kick)

Basically... Yes. Which is why I think that the Berserker can be retained for those who cannot care less, and a Martial Artist perk added for those looking for something more demanding. Like how ranged Perks have a choice of low demand Perks (SWAT, Commando) and high precision Perks (Sharpshooter, Gunslinger).

 

[s5yn3t]

Only that i would disagree adding an aditional perk for the sole purpose of bringing more demanding playstyle rather than on improving on the existing one.

Even right now as you compared those 4 perks, 2 of them people keep having issues on how mediocre they are.

Swat for example being basically a bullet hose of a perk with low damaging weapons alone can't really keep up with commando.
Not only that but survivability in general on that perk is much lower, as it can't deal with big zeds (if it comes to this) fast enough without his only utility that are flashbangs.
Sure he has more armor that depletes 1st before health does, but thats just temporary and can be depleted in the 1st minute of the wave.

or sharp with gs. One has supperior mobility with hard hitting weapons that can fully survive on his own... And other that can't kill even a scrake with one shot without going at least half on damage spike skills.
Altho since fal was added, sharp fully became a marksman that can take advantage of his other skills that were undesirable before.

all those pairs same the same goal they were designed for, and yet one of them is just being overshadowed by another.

Adding a new perk for the sake of just somebody wanting to play mortal kombat that would have the same design goal as the existing perk... Is just a waste of a slot and time.
​​​​​​
Not to mention on how it would even play differently if it was added?
it would still be a berserker with just added more movement abilities... Which can just be added to berserker to begin with.

​​​​​​

​​​​​

 

[taiiat]

Imagine if the Railgun had unlimited ammo and permanent auto-aim which deals full damage all the time, plus headshots based on RNG, that is how it feels to play Berserker-- It can be amusing sure (and the baseline dangers still exists), but it is not quite exciting. The sense that "I can do better than this" is lost, because this is as good as it gets.

a better example for how you are suggesting Melee Combat currently is, is having the Railgun, but just infinite Ammo, and no Lockon at all. and since you have Infinite Ammo, you say that there's no point in aiming because you can just shoot in the general direction of the Enemy and eventually it'll die either way.

 

[TheAphabet]

Only that i would disagree adding an aditional perk for the sole purpose of bringing more demanding playstyle rather than on improving on the existing one.

...

Adding a new perk for the sake of just somebody wanting to play mortal kombat that would have the same design goal as the existing perk... Is just a waste of a slot and time.
​​​​​​
Not to mention on how it would even play differently if it was added?
it would still be a berserker with just added more movement abilities... Which can just be added to berserker to begin with.
​​​​​

Well, I would say splitting into a Berserker and Martial Artist perk makes sense, but precisely because of the effort going into revamping the melee movement and combat system-- may as well get a new Perk out of it. The Berserker can (and should) be maintained, because it becomes the generalized melee perk that some players are more comfortable with (as noted in previous posts, not all players desire something more demanding), so those players can still dive right into melee combat until they are confident enough to try something new.

Moreover (and most importantly), adding a new perk for the revamped melee will also avoid community backlash, as noted from the reload-canceling ordeal on the Berserker's parry (to reiterate, I was in support of this change), not everyone is on board with a more demanding combat system. So it makes sense to retain the current Berserker as the melee Perk which is still effective at a lower gameplay difficulty.

Finally, creating a new Perk also provides the opportunity to introduce a new skill tree that can complement the revamped melee system, rather than hoping the Berserker's skill tree would incidentally be a good fit (or god forbid that the revamped system is designed around the current skill tree).
---

With regard to your comparisons of {SWAT, Commando} and {Gunslinger, Sharpshooter}, it seems to me that TWI never designed every perk to be equal, but around similar, albeit relaxed, philosophy of KF1's perk-role. SWAT and GS are Perks that can be effective at any level of proficiency, but Commando and Sharpshooters have slightly higher skill floors to achieve effectiveness; it should also be noted that SWAT and GS are both derivative Perks to the Commando and Sharpshooter, I don't think the intention was ever for them to be equal counterparts.
~~~

@taiiat: "permanent lock-on" was very specifically mentioned, because you still have to look in the general direction of a Zed to score a hit on melee, but the whole deal is simply that "there isn't much active thought put into playing Berserker outside of parrying"; much like if you took the ammo conservation, aiming and targeting (i.e. if headshots are just RNG) of out a Sharpshooter, there isn't really anything else going on.

 

[s5yn3t]

God stop leaking on me with all these good points, gosh.

Ok, i can agree on those points.
But the problem still remains on how much different it would be from berserker.... The only thing comes to mind is separating by the build.
By that i mean we leave bers as is because he already is considered a Tank, while martial artist is a light melee class.

Much swifter in movement and attack speed (by that i mean having access to like small dual wielding weapons like kunai for example)
But survivability remains the question... how will it be able to stay alive for long without solely relying on its ability to stumble zeds, some surviving skills most likely would carry over from bers tree.
But idk, currently i don't have any strength to think about it deeper....

On the comparison of those classes.... Ok sure, swat is a bit closer to commando on power level, but the viability of swat really goes out the window fast on hoe because of the whole spray n pray mentality... Even with the ability to slowdown and stumble zeds at the same time can provide useful, without a living support that has more ammo skill equipped, swat becomes the weakest link.
And the only skill that matters if you compare the two is how well you can pop heads with commando, otherwise commando will be able to out damage the swat without using as much ammo, even if you're a mediocre shot.
Even if you're good at both, surviving as swat will still prove more challenging than playing as comm.. its just how it is currently.

Sharp and gs.... the only issue i have with this whole comparison is their identical role and how sharp always gets boned when it comes to weapons.
Both are high damage output perks that are focused more on dealing with large zeds, and sharp should by all logic excel at it more than gs. 1 shot 1 kill with limited ammo.
Yet we see how bunch of crying babies cry about sharp being able to 1 shot kill large zeds and demand his weapons to be nerfed.... then later proceed complaining on how sharp is a crouch stand still class that needs all that damage to take out big zeds.... like make up your mind, do you want him to deal with big zeds swiftly or not.
Perk already sucks at surviving alone and relies more on his team protecting him, so its only benefit is the ability to 1 shot big zeds asap so it wouldn't destroy the team.... and yet we see those damage nerfs because 1 shot ability rubs people the wrong way.

So yeh... they are equal in their specified role, but different in playstyle.... Maybe TWI didn't design them the way you just described, but gameplay is what matters in their comparison.
(also sharp has a much higher skill roof of them all currently, as it has to pick the time and possition on when to engage while also making sure it has enough time to not get probed by a spider and what not)

Which reminds me.... can we finally get rid of the player having a penetration resistance of 1?
That thing right there is why hit scan players like commando/swat/sharp get really pissed when someone stands right infront of their aim point and absorb all the damage, waisting you the whole mag for 0 damage dealt, why you see them play a bit further away from teammates.... and why at times sharp sucks because his supposed 1 shot kill on scrakes end up being a partial damage because some c*nt stood right infront of you absorbing some of that juicy damage.
And the argument of friendly fire, you can shove it up allllll they way up your bum, as there's barely or even any servers that run friendly fire.
heck, let that modifier be directly linked to "if friendly fire is on/off".

If you want to continue rambling with me about this comparisons, hit me in dm... because we are drifting off the actual topic x)

 

[TheAphabet]

Ok, i can agree on those points.
But the problem still remains on how much different it would be from berserker.... The only thing comes to mind is separating by the build.
By that i mean we leave bers as is because he already is considered a Tank, while martial artist is a light melee class.

Much swifter in movement and attack speed (by that i mean having access to like small dual wielding weapons like kunai for example)
But survivability remains the question... how will it be able to stay alive for long without solely relying on its ability to stumble zeds, some surviving skills most likely would carry over from bers tree.
But idk, currently i don't have any strength to think about it deeper....

Well, I tend to think of it like this.

On the Martial Artists,

1. Attacks have to be combo'd to flow properly,
2. Normal attacks have minimal chance to no secondary effects (i.e. very minute chance of stun, stumble, knock back),
3. Final attack on combos have a modest chance of secondary effects. (e.g. 50%++),
4. Better movement, i.e. shift + jump in a direction will result in a small vault in that direction
5. Some basic combos available at level 0.

Additionally, the Martial Artists' skill tree will be used to either imbue additional elemental effects (i.e. burning, EMP, bleeding) OR enhance secondary effects, for example,

level 5:
<left> All chained attacks after the first strike will have a high chance of stumbling enemies. (i.e. all properly combo'd attacks after the first will stumble an enemy for a better chance of completing a combo without enemy retaliation)
<right> Final attack in a combo has a high chance of knock back. (i.e. completing a full combo will send an enemy flying back a short distance)

Level 10: (counter: unlocks parry+M1/M2 combo)
<left> Attacking after a successful parry sends out a shockwave, knocking enemies in front of the Martial Artist backwards.
<right> Attacking after a successful parry deals 2x the weapon damage.

Level 15:
<left> Final attacks have a high chance of stunning an enemy (if blunt) or inflicting bleed (if sharp)
<right> Chained attacks have increased damage based on its order N in the chain, damage = (1+N*0.1)*base_damage, e.g. for M1, M1, M1: first attack deals 100% base damage, 2nd attack deals 110% base damage, 3rd attack deals 120% base damage.

Level 20:
<left> Unlock extended combo M1, M1, M1, M2: Deals frontal AoE damage on final attack
<right> Unlock extended combo M1, M1, M1, M1: If final attack lands, increase rage by 1 (up to 5), each stack increases attack speed by 3% (max of 15%)

Level 25: (Zed time)
<left> In Zed time, thrust attacks (running + M2) deals piercing damage in a short line and inflicts EMP.
<right> In Zed time, air smash (jump + M2) deals AoE damage and inflicts burning.

Something a bit more zany would be a rage meter that builds up with combo kills, once the meter is full, you can activate a brief buff using "G" (Martial Artist would not have grenades) that increases resistance, movement speed and attack speed, so the player would have incentive to complete combos.

 

[HeatSurge]

Yeah, it's a little dull, but at least you must aim for heads and have good timing for parries to play really well.

The "hitting" system works, directionally, and it actually does matter where you swing from and how you move, but I never understood the need to hold the hit button for the "1-2-3" hit combo as opposed to mashing it. Mashing it might even be better (?). I haven't tested, but it looks like you might attack more frequently by mashing...

So, the "1-2-3" hold makes me think that the idea was there in the early design stages for a "combo-like" system (perhaps with increasing hit damage to reward holding and timing?), but it seems it was abandoned at the early stages and never removed or finished.

Kick sounds pretty awesome actually. Duke Nukem anyone?