Combat Abilities & Adrenaline
Info Stream
Yesterday we revealed more details surrounding the Combat Ability feature of the upcoming Reckoning Expansion during a livestream on the official MortalOnline2 Twitch channel.
What is it?
One of the major new features of the Reckoning Expansion is the Combat Ability and Adrenaline system.
These new and impactful additions represent the largest and most evolving change to the game’s combat to date.
You will be able to unlock and use new and unique Combat Abilities for every weapon group (with the exception of Lances) including Bows. Using these Combat Abilities consumes a new resource called Adrenaline, which is generated by engaging in combat actions.
This post will go into detail about the systems involved, what our goals are balance-wise, and what we will be tweaking based on feedback from the upcoming PTR which is being announced further down in this post!
Unlocking Combat Abilities
Every Combat Ability must first be unlocked by reading its associated Combat Treatise Chapter. These are consumable items which teach you how to perform a specific Combat Ability.
These combat treatises are named books written by in-world authors, and are currently planned to be obtained primarily from the existing Soldier and Hunter Taskmasters in every town, with abilities for bows, spears and daggers being obtained from the Hunter Taskmaster, while most melee weapon abilities will be obtained from the Soldier Taskmaster.
For example, the combat treatise for Two Handed Swords is called “Dancing on the Edge” written by Wentunio Vygos, and consists of three chapters, one for each Two Handed Sword combat ability:
- Dancing on the Edge Chapter I: Hilt Strike
- Dancing on the Edge, Chapter II: Flurry
- Dancing on the Edge, Chapter III: Hanging Thrust
Every weapon group has their own unique combat treatise book name, author and chapters.
Something important to note is that the chapters do not need to be read in order, however each combat ability does have a specific minimum skill requirement for its associated weapon group. For example you might need 50 Sword skill to perform Flurry, and 100 Sword skill for Hanging Thrust. Generally combat abilities which require more Adrenaline will have a higher skill requirement.
The prices of these ability unlock items are planned to be quite low in regard to the number of task coins required, and readily accessible.
Adrenaline
Every Combat Ability costs Adrenaline to use, which is a new resource similar in concept to Stamina or Mana.
Adrenaline is displayed in the center of the screen, and consists of 10 separate points.
While not fighting, your Adrenaline will passively generate up to 1, allowing you to initiate combat by performing any Combat Ability with an Adrenaline cost of 1, should your chosen weapon group have one.
Adrenaline is gained by engaging in combat related actions, such as dealing damage, taking damage, parrying, killing someone or performing a fatality.
When taking damage you gain more Adrenaline for each point of damage taken compared to when you deal damage, this was done to allow players who are outnumbered and thereby naturally receiving more damage and opportunities to parry on average, to generate more Adrenaline organically and have more frequent opportunities to use Combat Abilities, which if done skillfully could help them overcome greater odds.
When you have been out of combat for 10 seconds, meaning you have not hit or been hit by anyone, your Adrenaline will begin to decay until it reaches your passively generated threshold of 1. The intention here is to allow players to earn Adrenaline rather quickly when engaging in combat and allow the use of combat abilities reasonably frequently, however once the combat has ended or paused for a while, for any Adrenaline remaining to be drained away.
One primary focus of this decay mechanic is to move toward it not being viable to “preload” Adrenaline on your friends before a fight, and this is something that we will be asking for feedback on during the upcoming PTR.
We will also most likely be heavily tweaking the gain rates for Adrenaline when dealing and receiving damage, as well as parrying during the PTR. Additionally, we can also dynamically adjust the maximum amount of Adrenaline, should 10 end up not being the optimal number.
Clade Specific Adrenaline Modifiers
Each of the four Clades, (Human, Alvarin, Oghmir and Thursar) has a unique benefit to how they gain Adrenaline.
- Humans decay Adrenaline 3 times slower than other clades.
- Alvarin passively generate up to 2 Adrenaline instead of 1.
- Oghmir gain more Adrenaline from taking damage than other clades.
- Thursar have an additional +1 to their maximum Adrenaline, allowing them to generate and use up to 11 Adrenaline instead o 10. Thursar also gain slightly more Adrenaline from dealing damage than other clades.
Selecting your Combat Abilities
Please note that the Shared Ability icons are not final.
After you have unlocked a Combat Ability, you will need to open the Combat Abilities UI page, which is a new tab appearing in the Skill menu.
From there, you can select your weapon type, and view your unlocked Combat Abilities.
At the bottom of the page there are 5 slots, which indicate which abilities you have currently selected. These 5 slots also appear when you are in combat mode on your screen, and are separate for each of the shown weapon types, they also update automatically when you swap to a different weapon.
Below the Combat Abilities specific to each weapon type, you can view all of the Shared abilities, which as the name implies are shared across all weapon types. This means you can select which weapon specific combat abilities you would like to have in your set, along with which Shared abilities you would also like to include.
Currently there are 3 different weapon specific Combat Abilities for each weapon type, except for Bows which have 7, allowing you to for example have 3 Two Handed Sword abilities selected, along with 2 Shared abilities, or even all 5 as Shared abilities if you so desire.
Combat Ability Keybind Update
As we now have 5 separate dedicated slots for Combat Abilities, we needed to reevaluate our default keybind layout to make room for them.
Some notable changes include moving the interact key to E, Weapon Swap to Middle Mouse Button, and the default casting keys to Mouse Thumb buttons 1 and 2. If you do not have thumb buttons, you will of course we able to rebind these actions to any key of your choosing in the settings.
As such, existing players will also likely need to shuffle things around when the patch releases, however worry not, we will not forcefully reset your keybinds!
Types of Combat Abilities
There are two different types of Combat Ability when it comes to activating them.
- Automatically activated Combat Abilities
- Manually activated Combat Abilities
Automatically activated combat abilities are as simple as they sound, when you press your dedicated keybind for that combat ability, the ability will automatically activate and be performed.
Manually activated combat abilities are slightly different, in that they have one additional step.
Each Manually activated combat ability has a set of available directions, which represent all of the valid directions you can choose to initiate that combat ability from.
To use a manually activated combat ability, simply press your dedicated keybind for the ability, and then initiate an attack from one of the valid directions. You will then perform the combat ability using a unique animation that is specific to that direction, with a good example being the Two Handed Sword Combat Ability called Flurry.
Flurry is a Combat Ability which performs two horizontal cuts from opposite directions. It has two available directions, Left and Right, after activating Flurry, if you initiate it from the right, you will perform a right cut followed by a left cut. If you perform it from the left, you will perform a left cut followed by a right cut.
This applies to every other manually activated ability, where the chosen direction is always where the first attack will come from.
Combat Abilities can have multiple strikes within the same animation, and so although Flurry only has two, there are several abilities which have three and even four different strikes which each come from different directions. This means the number of different unique attacks which are being added to the game is quite large, as a seasoned player will need to learn and remember the sequences of many different abilities in order to preemptively parry in the right directions consecutively.
Combat Ability Variables
These are some of the values every combat ability shares:
- Whether the ability is parry-able
- Note: apart from naturally the bow abilities, currently this is only being used for Crushing Blow, and is heavily up to feedback on whether or not any of the melee abilities should be block-able only or if everything should be parry-able
- Whether the ability can be used while sprinting
- Whether the ability can be used while walking
- The set turn radius in degrees per second while the ability is active
- Whether the ability can be used while mounted
- This is necessary to restrict the melee abilities to be usable on foot only, as many of their animations will not work while mounted, however most of the Bow abilities can be used while mounted, in addition to the Shared abilities.
Combat Ability List
In this section we will mention each combat ability, along with what it does for reference and to get some thoughts and discussions knocking about a bit early in preparation for PTR testing.
One Handed Sword
- Thwart
- Perform three swift cuts.
Adrenaline Cost: 1
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Left, Right
- Perform three swift cuts.
- Riposte
- Raise your blade in a hanging guard, and immediately perform an overhead riposte should someone be foolish enough to strike you.
Adrenaline Cost: 2
Activation style: Automatic
- Raise your blade in a hanging guard, and immediately perform an overhead riposte should someone be foolish enough to strike you.
- Counter
- Effortlessly counter and parry any incoming strike while performing an elegant thrust.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Activation style: Automatic
- Effortlessly counter and parry any incoming strike while performing an elegant thrust.
Two Handed Sword
- Hilt Strike
- Bash the hilt of your sword downward into your opponent.
Adrenaline Cost: 1
Activation style: Automatic
- Bash the hilt of your sword downward into your opponent.
- Flurry
- Perform two flowing cuts.
Adrenaline Cost: 2
Deals 25% Armor Piercing.
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Left, Right
- Perform two flowing cuts.
- Hanging Thrust
- Perform an overhead feint followed by a strong thrust.
Adrenaline Cost: 2
Activation style: Automatic
- Perform an overhead feint followed by a strong thrust.
One Handed Axe
- Split
- Quickly punch the blade of your axe head into your opponent.
Adrenaline Cost: 1
Inflicts Sapped for 3 seconds.
Activation style: Automatic
- Quickly punch the blade of your axe head into your opponent.
- Hack
- Brutally hack at your opponent three times.
Adrenaline Cost: 2
Deals 10% Armor Piercing.
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Left, Right
- Brutally hack at your opponent three times.
- Under Hew
- Perform a left feint followed by a powerful strike from below.
Adrenaline Cost: 2
Hits multiple opponents in one swing.
Drains 20 Stamina on hit.
Activation style: Automatic
- Perform a left feint followed by a powerful strike from below.
Two Handed Axe
- Carve
- Perform a right feint followed by an upward strike.
Adrenaline Cost: 1
Activation style: Automatic
- Perform a right feint followed by an upward strike.
- Severance
- Raise your axe above your head and bring it down upon your opponent.
Adrenaline Cost: 2
Deals 5% Armor Piercing.
Inflicts Sapped for 5 seconds.
Activation style: Automatic
- Raise your axe above your head and bring it down upon your opponent.
- Cleave
- Cleave your axe through anything standing in your way.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Hits multiple opponents.
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Left, Right
- Cleave your axe through anything standing in your way.
Spear
- Sting
- Perform two quick thrusts from opposite directions.
Adrenaline Cost: 1
Each hit deals 60% damage.
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Over, Under
- Perform two quick thrusts from opposite directions.
- Impale
- Plunge your spear deep into your opponent
Adrenaline Cost: 2
Deals 10% Armor Piercing
Inflicts Limping on creatures for 5 seconds
Activation style: Automatic
- Plunge your spear deep into your opponent
- Sling Thrust
- Throw your spear forward before pulling it back into your grasp with an attached rope.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Deals 90% damage.
Activation style: Automatic
- Throw your spear forward before pulling it back into your grasp with an attached rope.
Dagger
- Precise Strikes
- Thrust your dagger from any direction.
Adrenaline Cost: 1
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Left, Right, Over, Under
- Thrust your dagger from any direction.
- Piercing Strike
- Forcefully thrust your dagger downward into your opponent.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Deals 50% Armor Piercing.
Activation style: Automatic
- Forcefully thrust your dagger downward into your opponent.
- Gouge
- Violently gouge your blade into your opponent.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Inflicts Bleeding for 10 seconds.
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Left, Right, Over
- Violently gouge your blade into your opponent.
One Handed Club
- Forceful Strike
- Whip the head of your club into your opponent.
Adrenaline Cost: 1
Causes the vision of your opponent to shake briefly.
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Left, Right, Over
- Whip the head of your club into your opponent.
- Rupture
- Swing your club upward into your opponent.
Adrenaline Cost: 2
Inflicts Dazed for 8 seconds.
Activation style: Automatic
- Swing your club upward into your opponent.
- Shatter
- Swing your club down onto your opponent.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Deals 10% higher Durability damage to equipment.
Deals 50% higher Durability damage to Shields.
Activation style: Automatic
- Swing your club down onto your opponent.
Two Handed Club
- Fracture
- Quickly thrust your club into your opponent.
Adrenaline Cost: 1
Inflicts Dazed for 5 seconds.
Activation style: Automatic
- Quickly thrust your club into your opponent.
- Breaking Blows
- Perform two powerful strikes with your club.
Adrenaline Cost: 2
Deals 80% damage
Drains 10 Mana
Deals 10% higher Durability damage to equipment
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Left, Right, Over
- Perform two powerful strikes with your club.
- Crushing Blow
- Raise your club above your head and bear it down upon your opponent.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Cannot be parried.
Drains 20 Mana.
Inflicts Dazed for 5 seconds.
Deals 15% higher Durability damage to equipment.
Activation style: Automatic
- Raise your club above your head and bear it down upon your opponent.
Poleaxe
- Shaft Strike
- Perform a quick strike with the haft of your poleaxe
Adrenaline Cost: 1
Deals 70% damage
Deals 15% Armor Piercing
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Left, Right, Under
- Perform a quick strike with the haft of your poleaxe
- Alternating Strikes
- Perform alternating sweeping left and right strikes.
Adrenaline Cost: 2
Drains 10 Stamina from your opponent.
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Left, Right
- Perform alternating sweeping left and right strikes.
- Rising Strike
- Perform a rising cut followed by an overhead strike.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Successful hits will dismount a riding opponent.
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Left, Right, Under
- Perform a rising cut followed by an overhead strike.
Polesword
- Heave
- Perform a horizontal cut with your polesword.
Adrenaline Cost: 2
Inflicts Bleeding for 6 seconds.
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Over, Under
- Perform a horizontal cut with your polesword.
- Sweeping Strikes
- Sweep your polesword in horizontal slashes.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Left, Right
- Sweep your polesword in horizontal slashes.
- Blade Dance
- Raise your polesword and swing it around you in a wide arc.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Left, Right
- Raise your polesword and swing it around you in a wide arc.
Bow
- Snap Shot
- Near instantly nock, draw and loose a single arrow.
Adrenaline Cost: 1
Deals 90% damage.
Activation style: Automatic
- Near instantly nock, draw and loose a single arrow.
- Piercing Shot
- Nock and draw a single arrow with 25% Armor Piercing.
Adrenaline Cost: 2
Activation style: Manual
To use this combat ability, activate it and then loose one arrow.
- Nock and draw a single arrow with 25% Armor Piercing.
- Volley
- Loose a volley of up to three arrows.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Draw speed is greatly increased.
Activation style: Manual
To use this combat ability, activate it and then loose up to three arrows.
- Loose a volley of up to three arrows.
- Spread Shot
- Cant your bow and loose three arrows at once.
Adrenaline Cost: 2
Each arrow deals 70% damage.
Activation style: Automatic
- Cant your bow and loose three arrows at once.
- Retreat
- Jump bacward and loose a single arrow.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Activation style: Automatic
- Jump bacward and loose a single arrow.
- Steady Hands
- Steady your bow arm, removing all sway while drawing.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Effect lasts 8 seconds.
Activation style: Automatic
- Steady your bow arm, removing all sway while drawing.
- Force Arrow
- Loose an arrow which will force an opponent backward.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Activation style: Manual
To use this combat ability, activate it and then loose one arrow.
- Loose an arrow which will force an opponent backward.
Unarmed
- Jab
- Perform a quick forward punch.
Adrenaline Cost: 1
Activation style: Automatic
- Perform a quick forward punch.
- Uppercut
- Perform a rising punch.
Adrenaline Cost: 2
Activation style: Automatic
- Perform a rising punch.
- Pummel
- Perform four punches from different directions.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Activation style: Manual
Available Directions: Left, Right, Under
- Perform four punches from different directions.
Shared Abilities
- Invigorate
- Increase your Stamina Regeneration by 50% temporarily.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Effect lasts 5 seconds.
Activation style: Automatic
- Increase your Stamina Regeneration by 50% temporarily.
- Rejuvenate
- Increase your Health Regeneration by 50% temporarily.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Effect lasts 10 seconds.
Activation style: Automatic
- Increase your Health Regeneration by 50% temporarily.
- Energise
- Increase your Mana Regeneration by 30% temporarily.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Effect lasts 10 seconds.
Activation style: Automatic
- Increase your Mana Regeneration by 30% temporarily.
- Quicken
- Increase your movement speed by 2.5% temporarily.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Effect lasts 5 seconds.
Activation style: Automatic
- Increase your movement speed by 2.5% temporarily.
- Amplify
- Increase your Spell Power by 5% temporarily.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Effect lasts 5 seconds.
Activation style: Automatic
- Increase your Spell Power by 5% temporarily.
- Empower
- Increase your Melee Damage by 5% temporarily.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Effect lasts 5 seconds.
Activation style: Automatic
- Increase your Melee Damage by 5% temporarily.
- Brace
- Increase your Physical Defence by 25% temporarily.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Effect lasts 5 seconds.
Activation style: Automatic
- Increase your Physical Defence by 25% temporarily.
- Poise
- Increase your Knockdown Resistance by 50% temporarily.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Effect lasts 5 seconds.
Activation style: Automatic
- Increase your Knockdown Resistance by 50% temporarily.
- Ward
- Increase your Magic Defence by 25% temporarily.
Adrenaline Cost: 3
Effect lasts 5 seconds.
Activation style: Automatic
- Increase your Magic Defence by 25% temporarily.
We Want Your Feedback!
If you have any thoughts, feedback or suggestions about the new Combat Ability feature, please provide it using the link below to our feedback questionnaire!
Territory Control Overhaul Keep Mechanics
It is with a heavy heart that we announce the following; Keeps will now receive their full suite of planned mechanics in a post-reckoning patch.
We of course realize this may come as disappointing news to many of you who were looking forward to engaging in Keep oriented conflicts once the expansion releases.
We hope that you can appreciate that this change comes from us being fully aware that getting Keep mechanics right is important, and desiring to deliver a complete and satisfying experience for Keep owners in one go, rather than only partially as would have happened under the previous plans.
What this means is that we are able to fully focus on ensuring the core Region conflict and Outpost Siege mechanics used by all 35 new Regions are as good as they can be, while also being able to do the same for Keeps in the next patch.
Reckoning PTR Date
Mark your calendars,
The Reckoning PTR will be commencing on July 2nd, we hope to see you there!
Note
Please keep in mind that as development progresses, any details described above may change or be adjusted where necessary.
See you in Nave,
The Star Vault Team