Rare, please rework the combat system.

@one-eyed-curly that's easier said than done. Hitreg can bug out when someone is on your ladder and they can waltz on up to you and 1 tap you.
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It's fine. Forcing a load-out is stupid in my opinion. I've been here since Day 1 as well, I don't share the same struggles that you seem to have dealing with these people. Sounds like a you problem.

Here are my thoughts.
You're not used to using guns in this game. Therefore, you wouldn't see the other side of how they are balanced.
Sword is obnoxious and makes me more angry than getting 1 blundied in arena or adventure.
Confining players to 1 gun 1 sword is stupid in my opinion. Let players have the freedom of picking and choosing their own weapons to fight with instead of binding them to an obnoxious and horrible utility, aka sword.
Hitreg just proves my point that guns are balanced. I got a hitmarker with a sniper? No damage. Unless you hit the center of mass of a player, you will likely get hitregged.
No gun is confined to ship pvp as you said the blundy is used to keep people off ladders.
Blundy was desgined to dispatch of players quickly and effectively.
Sniper was made to deal with players at longer distances while dealing high damage. Pistol was made to be effective mid range although 50% HP is a little bit much considering it has a fast reload and can be brought back into combat quickly.
If you make no effort to adapt to current meta, then you will get mad and likely quit, just like Fortnite. People are going to try, and the more skilled players and smarter players come out on top.
I just don't think the guns should be tweeked (besides flintlock) but rather the mechanics and actions taken during a fight. Jumping around is really annoying and sure, it's good to throw off aim, but it's a bit unrealistic when someone can bhop around your boat and 1 blundy you.
TL:DR Sword needs fix, confining players to certain items is bad, all weapons are made for certain reasons, flintlock is a bit op, bhop is a bit obnoxious, yes

@sea0fbeans Many other people share my opinion, as well as some SoT content creators. I never said to confine players to using a sword, I'm against that, myself as well as many others want more weapon variation so that double gunning isn't the only solution to getting cheap and quick kills. Joe Neate said in one of the dev vids that the blunderbuss was literally designed to guard ships, and so it was catered for that purpose. I've been a day 1 player, I've seen changes to the game that improved or ruined it. The old gun meta was the best and it's gotten progressively worse in my opinion. Also how would I not be used to using guns in the game when you literally have to use one, so I don't know what you mean there. There is balance to pistol/sniper in a certain sense as you have more tactical advantage in water when fighting someone who doesn't have 2 long range weapons. That's balanced. Also how does a faulty hit reg system prove your point, you're basically admitting that you play better when you have higher ping than other players? Hitting the centre of mass of the player will not likely register in a high ping scenario as you would have to aim in the player's previous position in order to land the shot even without a hit marker. Saying that a guns purpose is for ship defence doesn't mean it can't be used in other territories, you keep on twisting my words. You were right about the sniper and pistol though about their purpose. The guns should definitely be tweaked and so many other people think the same way, I know I wrote this post in spite of double gunning from my own experiences but I see so many other players suffering from the same issue and you clearly don't understand other player's issues very well. The sword needs a fix sure, add a 3 second delay after you land 3 successful swings and that'll sort out the issue. I also don't see an issue with bhopping as well, almost every player who is decent at the game always bhop and ive never had issues with it, you just need to learn how to flick while ADSd. Bhopping with the blunder does suck though, it's just a cheap and lacklustre method to getting a quick kill. I mentioned as well that I have adapted to current metas to attempt to overcome the issue of double gunning, i keep my distance when i can but double gunning is very difficult to counter on smaller ships and it almost gives zero advantage to the person who is on the smaller ship (sloop). The problem with the weapons is that they can be OP in certain aspects of PVP such as close quarter combat but can be relatively meta in larger diameters of combat. The sword isn't obnoxious as it requires skill in terms of precision timing dodges and readjusting angles to land a sword dash, (however noobs who sword spam will get nowhere anytime soon). If the pistol is so OP, then why does the blunder/sniper combo get more commonly used over pistol/sniper as the pistol must surely give players more of an advantage of quick reloads. I've used every loadout in the game and they are good for most circumstances but can be very OP and ridiculous in others.

@enf0rcer you tried Arena?

The sword is our ONLY meele option. Everything else is reliant on getting to an ammo box regularly.

Why not suggest adding some more meele options, like dual wielded daggers (1/6 damage per hit, no blocks, block button attacks with the offhand dagger) or Shovel (Slower attacks, but knockback with every hit)

@redwoodtheelf said in Rare, please rework the combat system.:

The sword is our ONLY meele option. Everything else is reliant on getting to an ammo box regularly.

Why not suggest adding some more meele options, like dual wielded daggers (1/6 damage per hit, no blocks, block button attacks with the offhand dagger) or Shovel (Slower attacks, but knockback with every hit)

I can already hear the cries of "dagger spammers!", "daggers are OP!", "nerf the daggers!", "daggers are a no-skill weapon!".

@bradderzthe4th
You say the sword requires skill? Aimlessly wm1 a player and kill them in four hits?
Takes skill to block? If you remember, than you have a chance, but a 4 hit melee weapon that is already broken and needs a rebalance doesn't take skill.

I agree that the man-to-man combat desperately needs to be rethought and redesigned.

• The sword is basically spammed by most players because there's no nuance to it at all. The block is unreliable and the lunge is near impossible to hit and incredibly punishing when you miss.
• Double gunning is a major problem. There's basically no downside to it. Ammo is usually readily available, reload times are very short, and they do enough damage to one-shot or two-shot people.
•The blunderbuss makes any melee weapon pointless. Why use a sword that takes 5 swings to kill a player when a blunderbuss can do it in one shot at the same range?

From a design standpoint the blunderbuss is too powerful but if you nerf it to a point it's balanced, it doesn't serve a purpose in the game. If we divide the combat ranges into three zones, short range, medium range, and long range, we can easily see how three of the four weapons fit well into those zones.

Short : Sword
Medium : Flintlock
Long : Eye of Reach

Each zone is covered. The blunderbuss competes with the sword and thus should be removed not just because it's overpowered against the sword, but also because it's redundant. The player should really only have the choice of covering medium range or long range. Everyone should have a sword and one of the two ranged weapons.

In addition, reload times for ranged weapons should be increased to 5 seconds. Alternatively, players should only have one bullet, which is more in line with how Flintlocks work in reality anyway.

The Sword should be completely redesigned. What works about the sword at the moment is the extra mobility when lunging off ships and shores. It's effective at vortexing a player but really doesn't have any nuance to it.

First, let's remove the block because it's never been reliable. We'll reintroduce something else to replace it.
Let's also remove the lunge for the moment and start from a clean slate. The other thing we need to do is remove body-blocking.

Let's start by naming six abilities.
• Block - nullifies swings, knocks you back
• Swing - 10% dmg
• Lunge - 25% max dmg (variable on charge)
• Parry - nullifies jabs, knocks back attacker
• Jab - 15% dmg
• Dodge - Leap out of the way of any dmg

I'm going to design each ability to be unique and useful and only be triggered with 3 buttons: Right Trigger, Left Trigger, and ( A ).

Block: This should be a Passive ability, meaning, if you have your sword out and you are not pressing any buttons other than Jump ( A ), any Swings that aren't directly behind you are nullified, but every time you block a blow, you are knocked back. It does not block Lunges or Jabs.

Swing: This is activated by tapping the Right Trigger. It does 10% damage when the attacker is vulnerable. If met with a Swing from the attacker, blades clash but no damage is dealt and there is no knock-back. Spamming the Right Trigger results in repeated swings with no 3 swing combo. If you keep tapping, you keep swinging and are only interrupted by a Block or an attacker's swing.

Lunge: This is charged by holding the Left Trigger and then activated by tapping the Right Trigger. It should be cancelable by releasing the Left Trigger. Movement should not be restricted (normal walking speed). The charge should take about 2 seconds and hold the charge as long as the Left Trigger is held. When charged, tapping Right Trigger should initiate the lunge. There should be no restrictions on jumping during the lunge, but the sooner you jump right after the lunge begins, the further you go. You may also trigger the lunge at any point during the charge up. The longer you charge, the more damage you do up to a max of 25% health, and the further you go. If a lunge connects, there is a knock-back. If it does not connect, you are not locked in place and are free to move, but are prevented from charging again for a couple seconds. During the charge and lunge you are vulnerable to any attack.

Parry: This is activated by tapping the Left Trigger. Any Jabs that are halfway to connecting are nullified. Timing is critical, but if done correctly will cancel the attack. If successful, the Parry will also knock back the attacker. The animation for a charge always starts with a Parry animation, but if no Jabs are nullified and the player does not release Left Trigger, the animation transitions into charging for a Lunge. If the Jab is nullified, the charge is canceled.

Jab: This is activated by holding the Right Trigger and then tapping Left Trigger once the Swing animation has finished and the animation transitions to a ready pose for the Jab. It's similar to the Lunge but without the long charge up time and can be canceled by releasing the Right Trigger. During the time your sword is raised for a Jab, you are vulnerable to any attack.

Dodge: This is activated by holding the Left Trigger and tapping the Jump button ( A ) and holding a direction on the thumb-stick.

All these ideas aren't perfect, but I think it would be the right direction to at least try and make the sword combat more nuanced and more interesting. It would encourage better combat than just spamming the three swing combo and jumping around like an idiot. Players would have to observe for certain animation tells that indicate what attack is coming next, and react to that in time. It becomes a mind game of not only timing, but of which move you plan on making next, and how you position yourself on the battlefield.

Other than blunderbuss every weapon/ weapon combo is only as good as it’s user. Put 2 guns in a player who’s had a lot of fps experience then they are dangerous, but them in the hands of a new gamer then there easy to beat. People other like to complain at weapon combos instead of recognising the skill of the opponent

i have been playing this game for 2 years..I play it competitively. I double gun and most other people do to. For instance all the best players in this game double gun. There are not many that use sword. Guns seem balanced. Dont even get me stated with the sword.

@bradderzthe4th Double gun is fine. Don't make people change the way they want to play the game just so the game is easier for you.

PvP is simple at the moment. If you have trash aim, use sword. If you have good aim, use double gun.

You say that double gunners ruin the 'pirate experience'. Well not everybody is a massive roleplayer PvE only player. Some people are PvP only tryhards. Get used to it. It's an open world pirate game with endless possibilities.

@bradderzthe4th The worst double gunner on the planet is already a better player than any sword user.

I couple weeks ago, my friend who has never played this game before started player I equipped the sword for him and told him to go up to people and just spam right trigger. He litteraly managed to spawn camp them multiple times just from sword spamming. These people where fairly experienced.