How to negate the "Never Attack First" Meta | Forums

[Kav0rk4]

Everyone is trying to think of these elaborate complicated fixes for defense being better than anything else, where as the solution is so incredibly simple.

This is something I just assumed happend all the time without ever checking actually, and I've played this game ~30 hours already.



Just make blocking take chip damage.


Easy.

[Wrander]

Everyone is trying to think of these elaborate complicated fixes for defense being better than anything else, where as the solution is so incredibly simple.

This is something I just assumed happend all the time without ever checking actually, and I've played this game ~30 hours already.



Just make blocking take chip damage.


Easy.

I don't think this is enough. Some Classes can rely on dodging. Parry and dodging with assassins still gives guaranteed hits in defense. Beeing in the offensive should be rewarded not punished. Having the Momentum in a fight should lead to hits while the defensive player should try to get momentum back to start his own offensiv.

Some risky moves which atleast rely partially on prediction may still give free hits but it shouldn't be a 100% reaction based safe counter attack.

[Kav0rk4]

I don't think this is enough. Some Classes can rely on dodging. Parry and dodging with assassins still gives guaranteed hits in defense. Beeing in the offensive should be rewarded not punished. Having the Momentum in a fight should lead to hits while the defensive player should try to get momentum back to start his own offensiv.

Some risky moves which atleast rely partially on prediction may still give free hits but it shouldn't be a 100% reaction based safe counter attack.

That's what feints are for.

[Robbeeeen]

Feints do not counter parries as they should. You can only feint a heavy attack at the beginning of the animation. You parry a heavy attack at the end of the animation. With enough experience, players can and already have perfected parrying at the last second, meaning feints will almost never work on them.

But even IF you fall for the feint, you can then cancel your own heavy attack that was supposed to be a parry!

A failed parry is just a heavy-attack that you can feint yourself and block whatever the enemy throws at you, because he has a slight delay on his attack-animation after feinting, but you dont have that delay for you defence. You can even feint your parry in time to counter a GB - consistently.

[Kav0rk4]

, players can and already have perfected parrying at the last second, meaning feints will almost never work on them.

You can even feint your parry in time to counter a GB - consistently.

I'm pretty sure this is both untrue. Have tried both myself during the beta, and no.. Depends on the attack, but doing the right ones, you can't do that, no.

[Robbeeeen]

I'm pretty sure this is both untrue. Have tried both myself during the beta, and no.. Depends on the attack, but doing the right ones, you can't do that, no.

Sadly it is true, as many others have already confirmed in this thread and others.

[khromtx]

I feel like the "turtle" meta / balanced fight is how the game is suppose to be played.

[NiceBoatUS]

The problem isn't that the "defense is too strong". The problem is the complete lack of 50/50s, which means that you can't mindgame a turtling player like in every other competitive fighting game. If you turtle (which is the optimal, lowest-risk fighting style - it's actually easy to prove in terms of game theory), the game turns into a series of QTE. There is literally no yomi involved.

A fighting game with no yomi and no possible mindgames is literally broken and doesn't allow for any serious competition.

Fortunately, the fighting system in general isn't at fault here. It's just a rather unfortunate combination o mistuned settings like chip damage, GB tech window and feint window producing a ridiculous outcome. Ubi simply has to adjust some of this stuff on release or on the first patch and FH is going to function properly.

I'm still fairly optimistic about this game and I firmly believe it's just a mishap that's going to be fixed thanks to the data from all the beta-testing that we've been through.

And really, people saying that "this is how it's supposed to be played" know nothing about proper fighting game design. You literally can't have a "game with no yomi", because without yomi there simply is no game. You can't outsmart your opponent when you can't play mindgames with him, you just have to solve a rather simple equation and then improve your skills until you're able to execute this solution.

[Robbeeeen]

The problem isn't that the "defense is too strong". The problem is the complete lack of 50/50s, which means that you can't mindgame a turtling player like in every other competitive fighting game. If you turtle (which is the optimal, lowest-risk fighting style - it's actually easy to prove in terms of game theory), the game turns into a series of QTE. There is literally no yomi involved.

A fighting game with no yomi and no possible mindgames is literally broken and doesn't allow for any serious competition.

Fortunately, the fighting system in general isn't at fault here. It's just a rather unfortunate combination o mistuned settings like chip damage, GB tech window and feint window producing a ridiculous outcome. Ubi simply has to adjust some of this stuff on release or on the first patch and FH is going to function properly.

I'm still fairly optimistic about this game and I firmly believe it's just a mishap that's going to be fixed thanks to the data from all the beta-testing that we've been through.

And really, people saying that "this is how it's supposed to be played" know nothing about proper fighting game design. You literally can't have a "game with no yomi", because without yomi there simply is no game. You can't outsmart your opponent when you can't play mindgames with him, you just have to solve a rather simple equation.

I agree with the last bit - this issue is easily fixable. A suggestions brought up in the reddit subforum was to swap the stamina-costs from offensive moves to defensive ones:

Blocking costs stamina, parrying costs stamina, counter-guardbreaking costs stamina, dodging costs stamina, sprinting costs stamina - and offense replenishes that stamina.

This will force defenders to eventually make an offensive move and open themselves up.

Furthermore it will fix the 2nd biggest issue I have with the game - being out of stamina is irrelevant because you can still perform all defensive actions just fine and just block everything or dodge away repeatedly.


It's just a matter of Ubisoft reacting to this quickly in one way or another, before twitchstreamers drop the game after playing their first turtle-matches and the game dying.

[khromtx]

You are correct, in fact that's what I'd do to: force your opponent to make false reads and punish him for hit.

But that's not possible in this game. because your opponent is not reading you, he's REACTING to you. Doesn't matter if you're predictable or not, since he's not predicting anything, he doesn't need to pay attention to your stance since he can switch his guard to block you. You can't play mind games if you can't trick your opponent. That's the problem in For Honor: you have enough time to react to anything. That's the point of the discussion here.

On one thing we agree, though: he didn't use his unblockable. But I suposse it's because that move always attack in the same side (right, if memory serves well). The Warden only need to keep his guard right and, as soon as they see an attack from other direction, adjust his guard.

In any case, thanks for the extensive answer.

Reaction based fighting is better than mind games. If this game devolves into a fighting game, it will quickly turn into a spam fest of only one or two move sets. I've already seen it with warden.