I for 1 enjoy the unintended feature, but I do see where the OP is coming from - I myself have been in his very position in other video games: for example, I was against quick-scoping in Call of Duty, and against BxR quick reloads and teabagging in Halo - both unintended side effects that were never fixed, simply because the majority of the community liked it. Sadly, all of those are still here in other games today, in some form or another - animation cancelling, quick-smiping, and, ugh, I HATE teabagging.
I like to think the gaming community is better than that, but am constantly reminded that the majority of the playerbase are prepubescent immature little 🤬.
Sorry, got a bit off track there... 😅
Anywho, I do think that the animation could be updated, in order to make it look even more official. For example, I always called it sword-surfing, so how cool or funny would it be to actually see your pirate surfing on his sword!? 😂
It could be programmed only to use that animation near water or on the edge of a ship or dock, I'd imagine, so that way it won't look like pirates are surfing on the ground. 😋
Regarding Rare's stance on the matter, I understand that they're acting on things on a case by case basis - like how they did with the aforementioned manuever, and even the dreaded double-gun exploit. However, I'm surprised that they're completely mum about other potentially unintended side effects of the mechanics that are still in the game. Effects such as:
- Quick digging
- Silent repairs
Quick-digging allows you to dig up loot 2x faster (simply press your stow away button twice very quickly). Great, if you're in a hurry! This shouldn't be needed. It should be removed, and then the normal digging should be sped up to its level, IMO.
The silent repair (simply hold block and then hold attack with a wooden plank near a hole in the ship's hull). If done correctly, you would only ever hear the 1st hammer fall, followed by complete silence. The animation is a bit weird too. It's not any faster or slower than normally repairing, but it's great if you know enemies might be nearby and that might take advantage of you doing said repairs. This is 1 that I personally think should become standard - all Rare would have to do is fix the animation, and balance it out by, oh I don't know... Slowing it down perhaps?
Meanwhile, they're also silent on others that were great, but were completely removed or nerfed into the ground, not because they were bad, but simply as collateral damage from other changes. Effects such as:
- Quick-draw
- Running sword slash
The former allowed you to counter attack by blocking with your sword and instantly aiming down sights with your firearm when you switched to it (block+weapon switch). Unlike the DGE, which is why this was unintentionally removed, it was balanced in that, because you only had 1 gun, you only got 1 shot.
The latter is still technically in the game, but it's nowhere near as good as it once was before they added the speed boost to the sword's overall movement. It allowed you to more easily dance around your foes and get behind their block (block+move+tap attack). I find it ironic that the speed boost was supposed to help the sword, when all everyone had to do was learn this simple trick. Even now, 95% of pirates don't know about it, despite the fact that I still find it quite useful, even in its nerfed state. Instead they consistently complain about how much slower sword combat is - and they're not exactly wrong.
It still baffles me that many pirates still don't know the utility of the sword dodge mechanic (block+move+jump). Many know of it and how to do it, but not that it allows you to jump through enemies - an incredibly valuable tactic. This is just another example of how little the overall community actually knows in regards to how deep the combat mechanics actually go or went in the past. Most still think it's mindless spam when they couldn't be any more wrong.
In regards to the advanced sword charge, I'm quite surprised that they don't just make it the default sword charge, without having to require the block.
I do question some of these side effects and whether they can be considered skill too. For example, some can be quite hard to pull off, but can it really be called PERSONAL skill if everybody can't reasonably do it? I'm not entirely certain that it could. The DGE is an excellent example of this. Pirates weren't skilled just because they could do it, because it took any sense of balance and counterplay, and made it walk the plank.
Some of the changes made were good ones, of course - for example, I'm personally happy that you can no longer chain-combo off of the environment. That was certainly a weird abuse of the system, IMO. Others included massive hit-stun and cancelling the cool-down of the sword lunge. I'm also glad those are largely dealt with.
This game is still very much a work-in-progress, and I sincerely hope that Rare can continue to do well overall and make their fans relatively happy, preferably in the near future rather than the distant future. 😊
