I would just like to add that I get the feeling that you've missed something when it comes to fighting more than one oppponent. You're talking about making 4 stick movements and parrying a few times in a row. If you're getting struck by multiple opponents at the same time within a small moment and block the first attack, you will block the rest automaticly. Same thing goes for a parry, if you parry one person and you get attacked by another whilst still in animation, your parry will be extended over to the next opponent and you will also parry them.
You can clearly see this in the two videos you've posted about being outnumbered that their guard is filling all three stances. The conqueror also made good use of his stance that blocks from every direction. So you don't have to worry about being forced to move your guard towards every direction to block all of your enemies. The Kensei never parried as far as I can tell, what happened was an extended Revenge animation sending people flying.
Now I don't mean to be rude or anything but the videos shown are not all that epic when it comes to the defense, what happens is that four people are mindlessly hitting one guy at the same time. It looks cool and all, but after taking a second glance, not very special.
You also mentioned to open someones guard with a GB. When fighting as many as three to four, do not do that. A guardbreak opens up ONE opponent and also you open up yourself to any attacker. Never guardbreak in a 1vMore situation if you cannot guarantee your own safety. Main reason one should guard break should be to throw the opponents into each other.
Wait a second, what mathias posted is neither an assumption nor an opinion about how the blocking mechanics should ideally work. It is how they actually work and what makes the defensive play you praised in your post possible. There is no need for further proof because he is one of the Hall of Heroes starplayers and has some hundred hours of gameplay experience so his word is one of the best sources we have at the moment.Originally Posted by DesperateRook53 Go to original post
There is a post from ubisoft about how to fight multible opponents. It was posted before the first public alpha, if i remember correctly.Originally Posted by DesperateRook53 Go to original post
Yeah there is a fair bit of misinformation here. Multiple guard movements in 1/4 of a second? No not necessary at all. As had been stated you get an all guard state whenever you block any attack for about that 1/4 -1/2 a second. Which means if you block one attack then any attack that comes in within that all guard state window will automatically be blocked. Then that will trigger the all guard state again so any attack that comes in within this new extended window will also be blocked and so on and so forth. So any attacks that would land within the same 1/4-1/2 second window will all be blocked as long as you blocked the first one. So the most you likely have to change guard will be once every half second or so.
So the most important thing to think of first is focus up on defense and try to lock on to the a target that is on the far left or right of the mob you are facing. That way you only have to focus on his attack direction and the one direction that all your external attacks will come from. To do this most effectively you may have to constantly maneuver yourself into better positions to keep people in your frontal arc. Blocking people behind you is possible but it can be tricky to determine exactly what side you need to block on if they are directly behind you. It's not 100% necessary but it does cut down on the amount of possible attack directions you will need to watch out for. Once you get used to this and start paying more attention to external attackers you will see how much better off you will find yourself when in such situations.
The Kensei in the final vid actually does a good job of this whether it was intentional or not. But it really doesn't matter much in this case since every one of his attackers is just spamming top attacks and as such it really isn't as impressive as it seems but still a good example of what I stated above. The video shows more how bad and uncoordinated his opponents were. You can even take note of how all 3 of his guard indicators are lit up and active showing what I talked about in the first paragraph. If one of his attackers would have been guard breaking or doing unblockables he would have had a much tougher time.
So now you are defending yourself in an outnumbered situation, what next? Well that's up to you you can create space with a few blocks and disengage/run to allies. Or you focus up on defense until revenge fills up, which doesn't take very long in outnumbered situations. Try to pop revenge as soon as possible, do no wait or you will lose your chance for the auto parry effect against anyone who is half decent as they will notice you have revenge and just back off and wait to see what you do instead of risk the revenge parry.
So now you are in revenge mode, if you did it right and you knocked a few people down it's time to get your first free heavy attack on one guy. Now What you do is probably character specific. Do you have good unblockables? If so then swing away as they try to hack you down. Otherwise zone attacks are an amazing tool to use while in revenge as you have unlimited stamina to use and you will hit everyone around, they will also do pretty good damage with the revenge buff. Also remember that your attacks are uninteruptable while in revenge mode.
Next is parries, these are great, even more great in revenge as they will cause knockdown and stamina damage. You might even get one or 2 of them now and then just by spamming heavies as 2-4 people swing at you with abandon.
As was mentioned by someone, do not bother guard breaking in outnumbered situations, it's a waste and will just cause you to eat a number of hits only to maybe(not even guaranteed as your GB might be teched)land one hit on a single target. But with all this in consideration it's important not to get overzealous. Depending on your class and your health before revenge you can still get taken down pretty quickly while in revenge if you don't defend yourself properly and pick your times to attack wisely.
Probably the most common thing to watch out for is guard break spam. If you are facing more than one person who are coordinated then odds are one of them is going to be on guard break spam duty. If not guardbreaks then unblockables whether they be shield bashes, heavy hits or whatever. Not really anything to be said for this part, you will just have to be aware and react accordingly to guard tech, or parry/dodge unblockables. You won't be able to nail em all and these situations aren't supposed to be easy so don't expect to come out of every 3v1 or 4v1 on top once you think you've gotten good. More than likely in most cases you are just stalling for time until help can arrive or your team uses the time to cap all the points or something.
1. Answered by others.Originally Posted by DesperateRook53 Go to original post
2. It's pretty easy to enter that stance. On a controller, right stick down. It's pretty simple.
3. It's not like i'm trying to take a poke at the guys in the videos or anything, they did good and it was fun to Watch. But blocking a couple of attacks and then pop revenge isn't special. Especially against people throwing mindless attacks.
To start off. As the 'gankers' you don't want to be a team of four. Especially in dominion. Now, if you really want to fight in such a situation, you just defend and abuse the fact thay they're mindlessly attacking you. You rack up revenge, pop it and hit em with perhaps a zone attack, then you simply do that over again. Well, you should never see it as fighting 'em rather just surviving them. Then again... Once you get to meet people thinking a Little bit more Before they strike, you won't need to Think about surviving.
4. If you ever meet 4 nice dudes willing to line up for you, give me a call. Not going to happen. Don't guard break when against four people.
Would love to post moments that I've had when fighting multiple opponents, it's one of the best thing I like doing in FH. Sadly, I forgot to save the many hours i had streamed during the open. All i've got left to show is one of the moments. It's not against four people, only two. But it's something I guess. Here you go.
Originally Posted by CaptainPwnet Go to original post
This guy has the knowledge.
There's also dodging. Attempting to remove yourself from the middle of a pack and creating some distance is always preferable to being in the middle of a mosh pit. It makes it easier to manage multiple people because it limits the amount of screen you need to monitor and potentially leads to opponents hitting one another instead of you.Originally Posted by DesperateRook53 Go to original post
The Conqueror was doing well for themselves anyway. Only reason he died was because he went for the execute. If you kill someone in a multi-opponent situation, never go for the execute. All it does is open you up to free attacks from your other opponent(s). The only one that's quick enough for you to maybe get away with it is Berserker's leg-sweep, and I would be wary attempting even that.
It also helps if you just bide your time and gain Revenge before attempting to parry anyone (except if you see an unblockable), since parries while in Revenge is a free knock-down, creating an instant opening to do some damage, especially because you get hyper armour while in Revenge.
Selections of the video here---but the provided gif especially---illustrate all of the points at once.
If you have the opportunity to guard break one opponent---most likely if you reposition yourself with dodge---you can also just toss them into another opponent. It'll cause both to stagger, giving you an opening for a follow up attack, and potentially cause one to fall over. It should be said, though, that this is very difficult when fighting any more than two people, and isn't really recommended.
As pointed out a couple of times already, this is incorrect. If several attacks are thrown at you in quick succession and you manage to block the first, the others are blocked automatically. Same goes for parries (and again, if you have Revenge and parry one attack in a close series, you'll parry all of them, knocking all of them to the ground).4 players attacking you all at once would mean you would have less than a quarter of a second to make four right-stick movements, not impossible, but highly unlikely. This is also assuming that these characters are all using light and heavy attacks, and not shield bashes or the like.
It is true that you need to be watchful of guard breaks and shield bashes, and those can certainly be frustrating to the point of infuriation, but again, mobility is your friend. Try removing yourself from the centre of the group, and you'll likely avoid most of the special moves anyway.
I don't actually think any other mechanics are necessary, and I question your choice of video to accompany this point as an example, for the simple fact that the Kensei knocked three of his opponents down and then failed to capitalise on the situation. Two of those opponents were half-health or below and could have been easily killed in that moment if the player simply attacked.A perfectly timed Parry in a 1 v 4 situation is a beautiful site indeed, especially when its followed up with another 3 consecutive parries and a revenge to clear some space. This is where i would tweak the mechanics a bit. For example, after successfully parrying four times in lets say 5 seconds, you would auto revenge block the next incoming attack rewarding players for having amazing defense. This also gives you a small window to attack the weakest target with a finisher or some other move. I feel like i could go on forever, so feel free to brainstorm with me.
More to the broader point, in Dominion anyway, it is actually beneficial to your side if the opponents are all grouped up like that. It means at least two zones are unprotected. Your goal in that situation shouldn't be to come out victorious, but to keep them occupied long enough for your teammates to gain control of the rest of the map. It's why I stay on defense 90% of the time when fighting multiple people. The only time I actually try fighting back is if one or more opponents are low life and all I need to do is throw a light attack or two to kill them.