I dunno, it just seems like I wanted so much to love this game (long time arenanet fan, gw1 was my first mmo) but for me  the problem was that the combat felt so incredibly unresponsive. Did anyone else feel this way? It just seems like there are barely any instant attacks at all along with a bunch of attacks with swing timers and such. It honestly reminds me of LOTRO's combat system which I loathe. 

I mean I could just be spoiled by TERA's awesomely responive combat system and trying to hold it to those (unrealistic?) standards. Everyone in my guild even said "wow really" at the tab targeting and I'm forced to agree with them.

Regardless though, what does everyone else think?

The only thing the combat left to be desired is more of it.

Man, what a fluid, responsive system they have going there. Once you start watching your foes for tells of big attacks you learn to use the right skills at the right times to mitigate or avoid damage and things really pick up.

What class did you play?  I didn't feel this way AT ALL on Mesmer.  I don't recall any swing timers.

There is only one skill that I had this feeling with.  On the Greatsword there is one move where you slam the sword into the ground and its stabs your target at range.  Because of the animation it roots you for a moment and mess up movements.  On a long range weapon set this is a big NO- NO to me.

Staff, sword/pistol, sword/focusfelt  and scepter stuff all felt very responsive to me.

Edit: I guess technically the basic attack on staff has a "swing timer" in that is shows a cast bar but you can move and its just because all basic staff attacks like that are all slow by design for all the casters.  It didn't really matter to me as that was the sort of "auto attack" and it never interfered with my other skills.

No, I loved the GW2 combat.

I played Tera in every BWE and I wouldn't call it fluid. Fun, sure, but it's got nothing on GW2.

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Originally posted by Volkon
The only thing the combat left to be desired is more of it.

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Yea I am looking forward to new weapon skills, like 2 handed axe, flail, polearms, etc.
 

I had a similar experience as the OP.

I tried every class both in PvE and PvP and noticed that there was an ability delay. There was a .5-.75 second delay before instants would fire or a channeled ability would start.

After practice you sort of just account for it and it doesn't become a big deal. I'm still not entirely certain if this is an intended mechanic or a weekend stability issue. All MMOs handle combat differently. You can allow abilities to fire the animation instantly and then let the server catch up so that it looks fluid, or you can wait until you get a server response before letting it animate.

Does anyone have insight into how GW2 handles combat and whether the results from this weekend were expected?

I like the combat in both games but prefer GW2's take on it. It's much faster, much more brutal and very dynamic. You switch weapons on the fly and a melee opponent can become a ranged one in a split second. There is also a bit more feedback during combat and when you hit a mob and send it flying, it just feels so good. At one point I was running randomly hitting mobs with a rifle butt, it's was a blast.

It does have issues and melee does require a bit of tweaking but the good thing is that this is still beta and what we experienced during the BWE is not final. Also, the devs are listening and are working on solutions, as is evident by the recent posts on the official forums.

Originally posted by remyburke
GW2's combat is ok, but I think in their current states, TERA wins hands down. I'm not sure if I like weapon switching in combat. We'll see if it grows on me. Overall, GW2's combat is pretty sloppy and clunky atm. I'm sure they'll clean it up though.

Wow, you aren't sure you like weapon switching?

Without weapon switching I would have been like 25-50% less effective.  You if you aren't weapon switching properly I don't think you really fully evaluated what you can do in combat.

It like saying you don't like trying to hit baseballs with a bat because you only swing it with one hand.

Originally posted by gestalt11

Originally posted by remyburke
GW2's combat is ok, but I think in their current states, TERA wins hands down. I'm not sure if I like weapon switching in combat. We'll see if it grows on me. Overall, GW2's combat is pretty sloppy and clunky atm. I'm sure they'll clean it up though.

Wow, you aren't sure you like weapon switching?

 

Without weapon switching I would have been like 25-50% less effective.  You if you aren't weapon switching properly I don't think you really fully evaluated what you can do in combat.

 

It like saying you don't like trying to hit baseballs with a bat because you only swing it with one hand.

Ya, like I said, it'll have to grow on me. i was doing it, because I noticed the increase in output, but I often use weapons to define my character. Having to juggle weapons just to be effective isn't something I'm thrilled about.

The combat was incredible and I had a lot of fun with it. 

Tab targetting is not required. Not sure how many times I died because something got in the way of one of my attacks lol

I tried tera, for me, the gameplay was to linear..the fps style is good but honestly it s not enough, the rest of the game is so classic and predictable (classes and skills) :/

I tried GW2,(I played 3 beta so I spent more than 60hours in game)  and it was a revolution for me .. the dodge system + switch weapon system( I love the 4  attunements of elem, u can perpetually switch depending of the sitation ) + the reactivity of the skills (like gw1) make the combats so fun and intense .. U have to focus, alone or in group, or u die  !  

I think u missed something ;D

Originally posted by justinope

I dunno, it just seems like I wanted so much to love this game (long time arenanet fan, gw1 was my first mmo) but for me  the problem was that the combat felt so incredibly unresponsive. Did anyone else feel this way? It just seems like there are barely any instant attacks at all along with a bunch of attacks with swing timers and such. It honestly reminds me of LOTRO's combat system which I loathe. 

I mean I could just be spoiled by TERA's awesomely responive combat system and trying to hold it to those (unrealistic?) standards. Everyone in my guild even said "wow really" at the tab targeting and I'm forced to agree with them.

 

Regardless though, what does everyone else think?

Its prolly your lag or ping or maybe your computer sucks.

Other then a few hours on Friday and Saturday I did not lag at all and had no problem with the combat.  In fact I felt the combat and animations were on par with WoW and was as fluid and responsive of a combat system as one can get.

Overall I think I prefer the way GW2's combat flows over Tera.  Tera just seems to stop and go to me for some reason.

I did like the way Tera used the mouse in combat to control where you looked over GW2's.  I found it much easier to keep facing the mob in Tera than in GW2's.  Maybe that's  a menu option I just missed however.

I loved the combat, so did the buddy that was ingame with me.

Frankly, we enjoyed everything the game had to offer. It was worth dealing with the login errors and such on day one, everything that came after was pure gold.

It's funny, because i had the exact same opinion of Tera's combat that you do of GW2. The constant stop-and-go 'action' i experienced during the Tera CB and how it seemingly ruined the sense of dynamic gameplay, left me wishing the devs had done a better job at implementing true action combat. But that's what the devs opted for and that's the way it's going to be, there really is nothing more to it.

And no matter, we both "win" as we get to play the game we enjoy :)

There are some "hinky" animation issues, like how a thief will come to a compelte stop before firing leaping death blossom if you are running.  And these really need to be fixed.

Other than that though, I really liked GW2's combat.  For people whining about "slow" animation times.  Think about this...

That slow animation time is a tell.  When you are fighting another player, when you see them prep a big swing, it gives you a split second to dodge away.  It greatly increases the amount of skill that can potentially be involved in combat.

If all animations were instant or super-fast, dodging and manuevering would be  essentially random luck.  You would have no clue if your enemy was about to unleash a big attack...you would just be dodging with the hopes of escaping.

All this said, there ARE certain skills that are instant cast like lightning strike.  But these skills can't really be spammed and typically aren't as powerful as non-instant cast skills.

Anyway, I think one big issue people have is that nearly everything in GW2 is mobile.  And in other MMORPGs, you can only cast an instant cast spell if you are moving.  So it kind of seems like everything you do while moving should be instant cast, but this just isn't the case in GW2.  Normal cast-time spells can be cast while moving just fine...I think it's something we just have to get used to.