Game designer on parrying.
Hey it's me again, back to bring you more on the state of the game from a professional designers point of view.
So I'm here to talk about the parrying meta that has recently cropped up. I'm not really into any specific style, but I use stagger for the headbutt that I can pull out whenever I want. Thats about it. My decks mostly do the work themselves without the defensives, although each stance clearly has its advantages.
People are finally learning to use khalt effectively after the last patch as I predicted, and I like that alot. Windfall is a good starter stance, but feels weak at high level. Stagger is hella useful if you have good reflexes, and sometimes even if you dont. I have seen some interesting uses of the stagger mechanics lately.
But parrying. The new meta. Is really. Really. Annoyingly overpowered. First of all, it's fifty fifty, which is just too damn easy compared to everyone elses. Sure parry spam is mostly worthless but its the effective contextual use of parrying which is fundamentally broken.
A good forsaken player can on speed deck or counter deck, parry my every second or third move, (sounds awfully close to fifty fifty odds doesnt it? Like they barely have to try) In addition to basic frame advantage over other absolver players, the forsaken gets no penalty for using a parry, unless they miss, which isn't really the case for other stances. With everything else, timing plays a key role in whether and how you can follow up with an attack, whereas parry just has a set time to respond within, and a long one.
The counter to this is supposed to be feints, but that is only really an effective countermeasure against people who don't know how to use parrying correctly. After all, it's not as though you have to spam it for it to be effective. You have to be good at it, like anything else, which means only using the parry when you know you can get it, and not every other attack. (although for some that is the same thing XP)
Parry is not post-counterable really. A string can generally be started by the time the opponent is able to block, and since people who are good at parries tend to follow them up with tough to read, ever changing strings, it can give quite the head start or soaring lead in terms of damage.
Parrying is not meta just yet but you can see it happening, and at high level it is definitely becoming any easy way for speed forsaken decks to soar above all other competition.
Frankly the idea of parrying being a move stopping hard counter is a little unreasonable to begin with. I haven't played a fighting game yet where an easy counter like that wasn't wholly abused to dominate and ruin pvp in that game. Dark Souls, For Honor, and Bloodborne all made that mistake, and each one of them has classes that revolve around it. Ninja havels, parry gods, and bullet spammers will always show up where there is a parry like that, and no matter how hard you think you've made it (take dark souls 3 for example) they will abuse it, because it is the only all powerful tool in the game.
In the words of my head 3-D modeler, "the problem with parries like that, is that it becomes a monopoly, because eventually the game becomes all about who can parry the best, rather than who can play the game the best." That is something the devs have to consider when looking at the design of parrying in absolver. After all, the effort put in to make this game solid and balanced is spectacularly well put forward, and it would be a shame to lose all that to the meta-monopoly.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
Praise the Moon
So I'm here to talk about the parrying meta that has recently cropped up. I'm not really into any specific style, but I use stagger for the headbutt that I can pull out whenever I want. Thats about it. My decks mostly do the work themselves without the defensives, although each stance clearly has its advantages.
People are finally learning to use khalt effectively after the last patch as I predicted, and I like that alot. Windfall is a good starter stance, but feels weak at high level. Stagger is hella useful if you have good reflexes, and sometimes even if you dont. I have seen some interesting uses of the stagger mechanics lately.
But parrying. The new meta. Is really. Really. Annoyingly overpowered. First of all, it's fifty fifty, which is just too damn easy compared to everyone elses. Sure parry spam is mostly worthless but its the effective contextual use of parrying which is fundamentally broken.
A good forsaken player can on speed deck or counter deck, parry my every second or third move, (sounds awfully close to fifty fifty odds doesnt it? Like they barely have to try) In addition to basic frame advantage over other absolver players, the forsaken gets no penalty for using a parry, unless they miss, which isn't really the case for other stances. With everything else, timing plays a key role in whether and how you can follow up with an attack, whereas parry just has a set time to respond within, and a long one.
The counter to this is supposed to be feints, but that is only really an effective countermeasure against people who don't know how to use parrying correctly. After all, it's not as though you have to spam it for it to be effective. You have to be good at it, like anything else, which means only using the parry when you know you can get it, and not every other attack. (although for some that is the same thing XP)
Parry is not post-counterable really. A string can generally be started by the time the opponent is able to block, and since people who are good at parries tend to follow them up with tough to read, ever changing strings, it can give quite the head start or soaring lead in terms of damage.
Parrying is not meta just yet but you can see it happening, and at high level it is definitely becoming any easy way for speed forsaken decks to soar above all other competition.
Frankly the idea of parrying being a move stopping hard counter is a little unreasonable to begin with. I haven't played a fighting game yet where an easy counter like that wasn't wholly abused to dominate and ruin pvp in that game. Dark Souls, For Honor, and Bloodborne all made that mistake, and each one of them has classes that revolve around it. Ninja havels, parry gods, and bullet spammers will always show up where there is a parry like that, and no matter how hard you think you've made it (take dark souls 3 for example) they will abuse it, because it is the only all powerful tool in the game.
In the words of my head 3-D modeler, "the problem with parries like that, is that it becomes a monopoly, because eventually the game becomes all about who can parry the best, rather than who can play the game the best." That is something the devs have to consider when looking at the design of parrying in absolver. After all, the effort put in to make this game solid and balanced is spectacularly well put forward, and it would be a shame to lose all that to the meta-monopoly.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
Praise the Moon
Comments
Im currently at CT level 233 & have the platinum "Absolution" trophie so id like to say im quite experienced.
From my time in combat trials ive noticed at my top teir matches against the best players ive faced they all use forsaken. I can usually hold my own as a windfall player but, with a person who really knows how to use parry there is no way i can win.
Of coarse there is a counter for everything
and parry is no exception as i was able to use windfall counter after being parried but only after learning theyre attack pattern and properly guessing what they were going to attack with and which way im going to need to dodge. My point being it took way more effort on my end to properly utilize my stance style powers since i have 4 different button inputs to lookout for whereas forsaken only has 2.
This one specific forsaken player i faced beat me a good 3 of three and have faced him several times since and the outcome is always the same yet after our first match i recieved a messege from him thinking it was going to be trash talk or something of the like. To my suprise he actually congradulated me tell me that i am very good player and whatnot simply because i was able to learn his attack pattern and dodge SOME of his attacks after a successful parry. He even admitted that if he couldnt parry that i most likely would have won...
I have been racking my brain for ideas on how parrying could work. Perhaps it could nullify the damage of the parried attack and potentially goldchain directly into a follow-up attack, sort of like a mix of khalt and staggers abilities. Of course, this is virgin territory as a game like this hasn't really been made before and I have never seen parries done in a way that wasn't broken. Take my word with a grain of salt here.
The devs have shown a great aptitude for fixing these kinds of problems in the past, I'm sure they will nip it in the bud in some creative manner.
I'm also not sure that it is only two directional. I've parried overheads with an upwards flick.
It's never so much that parries are broken. Its high risk, high reward. The best players, to counter this, confuse you and try their best to not be predictable if you are one of these parrying players.
With kalt 4/4 directions will absorb
With windfall 3/4 directions ( with some exceptions) will doge the hit
With Forsaken 2/4 (right or left) directions will parry
so 4/4 -3/4 -2/4
windfall is somewhat easyer you have 3 valid imputs against most moves instead of 2. and its spamable for movement and repositioning.
with forsaken its a 50/50 with windfall its 75/25
(i posted the wrong image and the edit feature wont let me remove it or replace it sigh..)
Forsaken is the only class that can guarantee side kick -> front kick -> gravity into side kick -> front kick.
This can go on perpetually if you try to guard it (which a kahlt has to do) and the simple fact that it can guarantee such a chain when no other class can is sample reason enough for it being overpowered.
But because people never listen, I'll sum it up with a copypasta I've made.
https://www.reddit.com/r/absolver/comments/76v8rh/why_forsaken_feels_too_strong/doh2lbi/
You can find various reasons why Parry is pretty much considered the god king among peasant classes, because the difference between Forsaken and everyone else is a vast ocean.
My point being in all this is that im pretty sure the intent from the start was this.
if forsaken is currently able to omni-direction parry a lets say vertical axe kick, its not that parry is to strong its that its bugged or something, cause that axe kick in question should your opponnent deliver it with with right leg (mirror effect) a left parry should be the only valid input not both direction.
if at any point kalt is not 4/4, windfall is not 3/4 and forsaken is not 2/4 then its bugged in my opinion.
considering they want us to beleive kalth is 1 star dificulty, windfall 2 star and parry 3 star, its safe to assume the original intent was that the harder you go dificulty wise, the less directions will be available to you to use your special ability vs a certain move.
If a move tracks to your parry as a Forsaken you just get to beat them into the ground.
Also, if you panic parry as a forsaken you can just parry again and catch various options. This beats delays, feints, and mixups slower than I think front kick.
What they did to Forsaken on PC was now you actually have to pick a direction. Against many straights, jabs, verticals, and breaking hits, Forsaken could parry whatever direction it wanted and would get the parry to connect and break their opponents flow. Now that only works against certain moves (IIRC Stagger's forward charge is one such example)
You can't compare windfall to forsaken.
Windfalls effectiveness in having 3 valid inputs to evade an attack is dependent on your opponents deck.
No matter what your opponents deck is, forsaken is either left or right.
I personally do not believe forsaken is op. It's just people using predictable decks.
Seriously. Feinting is a mechanic for a reason. Sweep attacks are to counter windfall, breaking attacks are to counter kahlt, and feinting is to counter forsaken. And just blocking is a counter to stagger lol. Were a decent amount of time into this games lifespan, so if something is troubling to your play style, you either need to adapt or accept that you arent able to win against that specific strategy, because like it or not, it is a strategy.
Also, a random image that looks like its made in MS Paint and is actually factually false isnt proof of "actual resources" as you say. I find a hard time believing youre a game designer considering just logging into this forum guarantees that youve created a new post complaining about something.
if theyre bad at the game, they need to get better.
Eh? Even I can reliably fit in a side kick after a parry, that's really not that hard to do. There is quite a range of moves between a jab and a side kick that all will land guaranteed.
To me the biggest problem with parry is that it can be used too often in succession. On many occasions I flicked the stick in the wrong direction, but still got the parry because the momentum of the stick flicked in the other direction afterwards. This should never happen, if I whiff a parry my opponent should get the opportunity to punish me, not the other way around.
Another thing with parry is that it really breaks the flow of the fight. Watching two good forsaken players fighting each other feels like looking at a slideshow. It's just not interesting to watch.
I mentioned that feinting is not an effective method of countering anything but parry spam. Because thats true. A good foresaken will use parry at unpredictable times, not over and over because, get this, they don't want parry to be countered!*gasp*
My point being, that just because a counter exists does not mean it's effective. Its not as though the parry animation is long or obvious. Its about as fast as a jab, so responding to it reactively is just not possible. However, that isn't to say I haven't had some luck reacting to it predictively. I.E. noting when my opponent tends to parry and feinting then, but the problem is again that the skill cieling is even higher than that, as there are people who can parry every third or so move no problem. Thats too often for such a low risk move.
I'd also note, I am at CT 400 and have literally only lost with my current character to 4 people. (all of whom are on my friends list now because they're awesome) Two of which were really skilled at using parry in the way I have described. They told me themselves that they won because parrying is just much easier than everything else in varying words. It really isn't a git gud thing, and using that as an argument isnt conducive to positive change in the game.
Thats not to say that it isn't a valid response when someone actually is lacking in skill, but I feel I established a solid argument in my op, and showed that I have some knowledge of the actual functions of the move, so here its just non-applicable and a little caustic.
Trying not to be a passive aggressive dick, so please don't take it that way, I am genuinely trying to be friendly. I'm autistic as fuck and not good at communicating, so if you feel insulted, please direct your complaints to God at 1-800-YUR-SAVD
Thank you for your time,
Praise the moon
A "Counter" is something that completely negates something in every case, whereas a "Check" only may negate something.
So you can't say "Feinting is a counter to Forsaken" because it's merely a check as you aren't actually guaranteed anything by feinting. I mean you can't influence if your opponent blocks, dodges or attacks. You can read it, yeah, but if you have to read your opponent then it can't be a "counter".
The same applies to "Sweep attacks counter windfall" as you have the option to jump over the sweep. If it were only "dodge left - dodge right" then you would be correct, but it isn't.
But apart from that, windfall always having 3 options to dodge an attack is straight up wrong.
Easy example: let's take a low sweep. huh... it covers dodge left (only speaking about the style dodges), dodge right and duck at the same time o.o
Now add in a Meia Lua that covers dodge left, dodge right and jump at the same time o.o
Now you literally have a chance of 50/50 of getting a hit in against a windfall user (disregarding blocking and dodging back)
And now to wrap my post up, I'd like to give a little idea that I think would improve the situation of Forsaken in terms of healthiness to the game, as Forsaken has no actual dedicated counter. Just add in the option to block high against attacks that come from above like axe kick and/or the option to block low (pardon me, I'm in a rush and don't have a good example for this at hand right now). It wouldn't change the situation concerning a dedicated counter, but there would be more options for counterplay and mix-ups.
Was thinking about directly putting this idea in the Suggestions forum, but here it can be discussed first.
Greetings
Option Select, proper buffering, and literally just parrying twice all counter feinting against a Forsaken.
Telling people to git gud when you don't know a proper method of circumventing the thing people are complaining about is just kinda rood. This is literally a fucking fighting game, a la tekken or Street Fighter. How the hell would the main component of the fighting game not keep people into a fighting game.
If you unleash a clusterfuck of content before balancing your game it just becomes an utter shit show that everyone ends up leaving (I'd cite dragon nest, but its so dead now no one knows what the hell it is)
I won't disagree that content would be nice but balancing should definitely come first because as it stands most of the players on PC all use such a defined meta of strafing parry users with front kick/side kick, and scare away the newer players by taking a consistent dump on them.
First, people gold-linking and crowding me was a problem, then I figured out how to find openings and learned how to dodge better. Then it was the charge attack spam "meta", which can be stopped by charge breakers. Then it was the Stagger move meta, where I kept seeing the same stuff over and over, and learned to counter it, and on and on. This is a game with a high skill ceiling, and you have to play a lot to win without luck. From this experience, and by doing my own thing and not following metas, I've learned that the game is balanced. If it was completely stacked, I would be using stagger moves and would be playing Forsaken to win. More likely, I would have quit.
On the other side of the coin, the people getting scared away by getting crushed have nothing but PVP, while the competitive-minded people will keep playing after a loss, if only to learn to defeat it. So you tell me what will keep more people invested? From my experience, a lot of the fun in the opening game was the cooperative play, the interesting brawls against multiple NPCs, and the learning curve. Once that's over, all you have is isolation and competition in the current game-state, which may be good for certain people, but will not have mass appeal. This isn't Street Fighter, Tekken, Injustice, or Mortal Kombat -- nor is it Dark Souls. It's a new IP that has to carve out its own identity, and there's a really good foundation, here, but that's all that's there at the moment.
Anyway, as a final comment, since I don't like writing comment novels, is that all of these issues will be scrutinized in ranked mode. Personally, I've begun to ease up on people I feel are new at the game, and back off, giving them a chance, while practicing my dodge. Not that everyone will do this, but giving new people a chance will keep them playing. If there were more cooperative, sparring-based events, or school events, etc., then there would be more cooperation and less toxicity. Just my two cents.
Someone mentioned that I only lost 4 times (not the case, I said I had only lost to four people-now five, and those individuals are the sort I duel all the time because... Well I wanna beat them), I also dont count lag based losses, usually with a bit of lag I will win anyways cuz my deck is about predictions and options, not counters and responses, but anything where the person was teleporting I dont count towarda that. There are also people who beat me in the first or aecond fight, and then lost all of them after that. I also dont count those people cuz chances are they were using spam decks that just took me a little longer to read because my pneumonic device is a little obsolete. As long as they lost consistently in the end, I count that as someone who cant beat me.
That said I have lost prolly a few dozen times, and won hundreds. But this was on a character that I created after learning the game and designing a really strong deck. My record prior to that was obviously much spottier.
The reason I brought it up is because *I'm* OP. I beat basically everyone I come across (finding more good players lately though). So even if someone does know how to parry well, it often only gets them so far, but it DEFINITELY gets them farther than others. In a way this gives me a good perspective of the state of the game, as I literally can compare the measurable difficulty of my opponents via my health bar.
It's very notable that of the 5 people who can consistently or off and on beat me, 3 are forsaken. One of them is a GOD-TIER absorb user. And another is a stagger user who literally only uses the backstep kick in staggers defensives. That is not a balanced mix. Not at all.
So yes, I beat the parryers and I'm still on here complaining about it. Because my skill is irrelevantly high for the problem on a mundane level. That doesnt mean that there isnt a problem. Parrying clearly has a low skill cieling and is low risk high reward. The mechanics of parrying are too similar to failed models in past games and it needs to be looked at before this game becomes about parrying instead of about bad ass martial arts immortal dimension bending matrix ninjas who secretly are being manipulated into being low rent mall cops for a bunch of greedy old people.
Jjust sayin.
I would also like to point out that the statement
"I personally do not believe forsaken is op. It's just people using predictable decks."
Is hardly quotable, or true, it actually is really vague, however I definitely will give in that it is simple (couldn't help that joke).
I would like to point out that there is a huge discrepency between the players that think there is such a thing as an unpredictable deck, and those who do not. It certainly is no indicator of skill to announce that you can't just read any deck, as the information you need is literally right in front of you when playing the game.
That said, this is also a topic to discuss a rising issue at high level. If you don't have anything to contribute to the pool of applicable knowledge because you don't play at high level, maybe openly mention that you are low level, instead of wasting people's time with made-up adages and one-liners of your low-level opinions because you think stupidly butting your head against a wall much bigger than you is cool.
Let me put it this way, if you aren't winning almost every match in this game right now, you don't have the applicable knowledge. The skill gap is that high, so I can say that with some degree of certainty. All the skilled players, who understand this games mechanics, should be winning just about every match in the current state of the game. It may seem elitist but really I think its just because the game is too new to have very many skilled players, not because the unskilled do not have the aptitude for it.
Forsaken is op af, I finally started using it. My first reaction upon integrating it a little better with my deck was "oh no, its retarded."
Memories flash backwards through my head, a knight in extremely heavy, ridged, stone gear, a teensy tiny shield and no sword is doing handstand flips towards me. Carefully I wait, dodge, attack, block, attack, and I hear the oddly recognizable sound I have heard a million times before. The sound of a bucket hitting the surface of water in a stone well. With a distortion effect. My hand twist s as my arm and giant sword flails sideways off of my opponents 4 inch diameter shield, you can almost hear the skull kids chittering laugh as the knight nimbly front flips around behind me, pulls an axe the size of manhattan out of his rectum, and proceeds to smash it into my back while I am still paralyzed from having my sword deflected by a four inch shield. RIP me.
When are we going to learn that none of us like parrying as a mechanic, and stop putting it into every OOFE game that comes out? It's like the inevitable heat death of the universe. Every OOFE gets destroyed by players abusing the one full counter skill or mechanic in the game, so why do we keep expecting it and asking for it? Like it doesn't annoy the shit out of us when eventually you just can't play pvp anymore because everyone is just full countering you over and over and over and over. It's to the point where attacking more than once is a liablility and all semblence of the game that was has faded into git gud obscurity.
Excuse my dramaticism.
Thank you for your time,
Praise the moon.
It's not a bad mechanic. Parrying is similar to a block that is also an attack -- not a passive block, but a block that jams an attack and can setup a counter or take an opponent's balance, which is a thing in martial arts. Should everyone be stumbling around with stagger style because you personally don't like forsaken? What a load of rubbish.
Also I'm surprised to hear anyone who games genuinely thinks that they can determine whether or not something is OP based off of a few minutes of gameplay. Especially since I, you know, JUST posted something about it being a high level problem that is only applicable when you are actually capable of pvp at high level. Apparently thats not the case for you.
I love when people who are overly caustic try to make themselves sound like they understand something by literally just describing it. Not by actually contributing something useful, just repeating what everyone already knows and then attaching one sentence with a differing opinion to the beginning and end of the paragraph.
Insight you need to take a breath, stop assuming I think my way is the only way to play, and chill out. If you want a place in the conversation so badly, learn how to use forsaken, watch some people use it, and then come back with an informed opinion instead of wasting time with your insults and unfriendliness.
On a further note, did you actually use parrying in real martial arts as an argument? Do you need to further descend into complete irrelevance? As someone who ACTUALLY does martial arts (or used to when I was growing up, not so much anymore) I can tell you that I never blocked someone, had them completely paralyzed for a second and hit them with no reaction a half second later. If you know someone who parries like that, you should let me know, cuz I wanna find out how they managed something so patently unrealistic and ridiculous.
If you intend to just keep being rude and unfriendly then please dont bother posting under anything of mine. I'll just ignore it, I dont need to waste my time on posts that have no purpose.
Thanks I guess?
Praise the moon.
I also like that you assume I've only played a few minutes of gameplay -- I've been playing this game since it's release, and have played against many forsaken players. Keep talking about being rude -- calling people stupid and unable to respond to a public discussion because they aren't good enough (in your opinion), in my opinion, is very rude. Unlike you, I don't use self aggrandizement as a basis for an argument. On the flip side, I'm having a good time listening to endless Youtube videos on gamer elitism. It's quite sad.
First, maybe I'm old, but being on topic used to matter in forums. Like alot.
Second, its a growing trend that caustic people will describe something, with a bunch of information people already know, and then add an opinion to the beginning and end of the paragraph to make it sound like they understand the conversation. It's worthless and adds nothing to the conversation.
Third, any gamer would tell you that you arent going to discover the depths of somethings high level capability 5 minutes after picking it up. They also prolly wouldnt post about it in a topic where it was literally just said that this was a high level problem specifically.
Fourth the windfall thing was irrelevant, I never compared anything, I was only talking about forsaken, which has nothing to do with windfall.
If you really want to be involved in the conversation so badly go do some research and actually figure out what we are discussing here. Watch some videos, learn forsaken yourself, but dont just come in here all butt hurt for no reason.
Also, I have never seen someone block someone elses attack in real martial arts, paralyze them, and hit them with no reaction a half second later. Please link that video, I want to know how they did it. So yeah. I'd call that irrelevant.
The game is new. There arent that many high level players. Its not about elitism, its about not joining a conversation you have nothing to add to. I dodnt assume you only have a few minutes of game time, I was pointing out that you "just picked up forsaken to see how op it is" Which isnt a measure of its high level applicability.
Thank you for your time I guess?
Praise the moon.