Actually there is boss who "one shot" tank, using heavy atack, Even if tank is blocking. Its Celestial Warrior.

Well... intresting idea but to be perfect everything should depands. For example, heavy atacks from daggers should be blocable. But what if boss has daggers for 1m long? Hard to implement...

And roll dodge in heavy armor... its ever more "wrong" that blocking heavy atacks.

Uhm.... I think what you are asking for is already in game, albiet slightly different.

1. Certain heavy attacks can be blocked. Examples are the NPCs wb or Normal heavy swings. These are blocked easily and put the attacker off balance. Not the defender. You can exploit their off-balance and knock them to the ground with a heavy attack. Awesome right?

2. Certain channeled attacks can be blocked but at a price. Ie: the defender gets set off -balance. Examples are certain bigger adds like flesh atros in vICP. These guys channel a double handed heavy smash that can be blocked... but your toon will visibly keel over and lose footing for about 1 second whereby you drop block and will take full damage from other adds.

3. Certain heavies will just go through your block and kill you regardless. Common examples can be seen in a lot of boss fights. They are normally very very telegraphed and normally channels that should be interrupted or dodge rolled. The easiest ones I can think off right now is the new dungeons. Velidreths channel, the big ass lizard that charges you (when you need to go behind the lightning channelling NPC) etc.

As you gain experience and complete more and more content, you will be able to tell which attacks can be blocked, should be blocked and should be interrupted/dodge rolled. The common rule of thumb if your new is, if an add is BIG, or if its a boss, the odds are you shouldnt try to block their heavies. Try bashing or dodge rolling. Smaller adds, especially humanoid NPC heavies can normally be easily blocked.

So in short, what you are asking for, which is interactive blocking, is already in game.

LazerusKI wrote: »

Im a returning player, and back then the thing that basically ruined combat for me was...Blocking.
Its kinda sad to see that its still the same.

But why exactly? Let me explain

You need to Block to defend against a Heavy Attack, right?

Now...i cross two Daggers in front of my face to block a guy with a twohanded hammer...
Seriously, i should have my daggers merged into my face then.
Even a shield makes no real sense there, i mean...you would break your arm and fly through the room.
Our shields are not made out of Vibranium, you know?

But logik isnt the issue there, its a game afterall. it just feels...boring.
Heavy Attack < Block
Block < Light Attack
so basically spam all you want, you cant stop it anyway.

I would have loved to see a system like this:

Light Attacks (including some skills) < Block < Heavy Attack < Dodge
that way combat would feel more alive,
i would be able to defend against light and fast attacks, but a heavy attack breaks through my defense.
if he hits me with such an heavy attack, i would fall over.
if i dodge and he misses me, he stumbles and i get an opportunity to knock him down.

Combat would be more interactive then and overall more interesting, and not just "spam skills to win"

As @Vangy demonstrated: we have an active Blocking system in place. And it works.

What you @LazerusKI refer to, is that Real Life Blocking is quite something else.
And yes it is.
But also in Real Life, blocking was not done that much for 1vs1 or small scale combat:
In Real Life you normally only block arrows with your Shield: expensive light weight projectiles that are very deadly.
Heavy Attacks, be it from melee or heavy spears, are in Real Life mostly deflected with your Shield, not blocked.
Deflecting an attack does not make you fly through the room.
It is only when you are out of balance or unaware, that you really block, in a last resort reflex to survive.

Deflecting an attack with your weapon or shield is called a "parry".
And a well performed parry is, also in Real Life, the start for highly damaging return attack.
Exactly what happens in the game mechanics of ESO.
The size of the ESO shields are also that of parry shields (a little bit bigger than pure parry shields like 30 cm diameter bucklers of the Roman Gladiators).
And the difference in parrying with a parry shield and parrying with a weapon is not that big.
That small difference is expressed in the small additional benefits of the Sword & Board skill line: only 15% additional protection against projectiles and only 20% increased blocking Resistance.

I think also that we have an ok interactive Blocking system in place for parry shields, which is well reflected in the game mechanics numbers
Only unfortunately that we have always a static block animation including crossed daggers.
But how else ?
A parry animation, like the awesome animation of the Blade of Woe, would be very unpractical.

LazerusKI wrote: »

hrothbern wrote: »

As @Vangy demonstrated: we have an active Blocking system in place. And it works.

What you @LazerusKI refer to, is that Real Life Blocking is quite something else.
And yes it is.
But also in Real Life, blocking was not done that much for 1vs1 or small scale combat:
In Real Life you normally only block arrows with your Shield: expensive light weight projectiles that are very deadly.
Heavy Attacks, be it from melee or heavy spears, are in Real Life mostly deflected with your Shield, not blocked.
Deflecting an attack does not make you fly through the room.
It is only when you are out of balance or unaware, that you really block, in a last resort reflex to survive.

Deflecting an attack with your weapon or shield is called a "parry".
And a well performed parry is, also in Real Life, the start for highly damaging return attack.
Exactly what happens in the game mechanics of ESO.
The size of the ESO shields are also that of parry shields (a little bit bigger than pure parry shields like 30 cm diameter bucklers of the Roman Gladiators).
And the difference in parrying with a parry shield and parrying with a weapon is not that big.
That small difference is expressed in the small additional benefits of the Sword & Board skill line: only 15% additional protection against projectiles and only 20% increased blocking Resistance.

I think also that we have an ok interactive Blocking system in place for parry shields, which is well reflected in the game mechanics numbers
Only unfortunately that we have always a static block animation including crossed daggers.
But how else ?
A parry animation, like the awesome animation of the Blade of Woe, would be very unpractical.

thats why i mentioned the heavy 2h weapons. you can block them with two crossed daggers. a direct hit on your shield or crossed blades should not bounce back the attacker like they just hit the shield of captain america.
also ingame you dont really parry, you literally block the attack face on. you dont deflect it at all. if it would actually parry then sure, the current way makes sense. but thats not what happens. you hold up your weapons or shield right in front of you and block that strike, not deflect it. the attacker stumbles back like he just hit a solid wall.
also take a look at the last TES game, Skyrim, how it handled that. Blocking there (with basically the same shields) was a defense against light attacks, and heavy attacks where meant to penetrate that block. in ESO its the other way around. Block heavy attacks and use light attacks to get through.

You are absolutely right when you look at the animation showed of Blocking !
That animation is static "absorbing" the very big blow in the same way as the small tickling hits, regardless.
And when you have two daggers, the last thing on earth what you are going to do is to cross them before your head !
With daggers you can easily move and if unavoidable: while making contact with the sword blade sliding along that blade and deflect somewhat in the opposite direction as you are moving. And maces and big hammers are always slow enough to avoid.

But nothing is perfect, especially animations are difficult.
I would really love if there would be much more martial art and sword play combo's in the game influencing weapon damage, speed, etc, and.... the animations. Crit would disappear as a static number and come back as a base dexterity value multiplied with a combo move that succeeded. Including a general higher level of weapon damage from certain combo's. Like in real life.
The game is now very much a modern warfare game in a medieval lore skin: just replace magic and stamina abilities by high speed ammo of different sorts.
This game has the real life effects integrated, but foremost in the numbers.

But the calculatory consequences will be terrible if we want it all !
Need better hardware, better software, better connections...
Just have to wait perhaps only one or two decades.
I started doing Dungeon and Dragon games 40 years ago, with friends, coke and chips, with paper, a gamemaster, allignments and very weird dices.
And I dreamed at that time of what would come with the development of the computer for gaming.
(to be noted: it was NOT big blue IBM that was developing the micro computer. It was driven by freaks, nerds and especially gaming freaks... and very big smile: flower picking gaming freaks)
And this game is the most wholesome game I have yet experienced.
So... @LazerusKI , don't worry. It will all come. More realistic, more awesome graphics, no lag. Just give it time

Vangy wrote: »

I only have 1 question for the OP...

1. Have you tried tanking before? Heavies go through block... LOLOLOL..... U want to bury the little number of tanks left in the game? Sure if you want ur two crossed daggers to not work against heavies im all for it. Just dont tell me my huge ass shield cant block ur 2h hits... Cos I say it can and should. Its just a matter of perspective.....

2. Its bad animation... That's all. Blocking is already punished with 0 stam regen and block costs. Making heavies go through it and we might as well roll with 3 DPS and 1 healer and never need tanks. The whole idea of a dude in heavy armour carrying around a big ass shield is to..... well be able to take hits. If your immersion is getting ruined just pretend ur tank is a 7 foot dude lugging around a 5 foot tower shield. That can block anything.... Like you'd literally need a ballista bolt to go through that.....

Sorry if I come off harsh... but its threads like these that have gotten blocking hit so hard... I dont want to encourage one more thread like this.

thats why i mentioned an alternate system similar to how it was in Skyrim. Away from the "block a heavy blow from a hammer that weights several dozen kilos with two chopsticks or a simple small shield"
it wouldnt break tanks at all, in fact i think it would even increase their use and enhance the fun in combat.
small weapons would be fast but easy to block or deflect, a shield would be able to completely negate the damage of those light hits. the enemy would waste his ressources trying to get through your block with just spamming.
heavy weapons on the other hand would be slow and heavy. hard to block but easy to dodge and parry.
basically you would be able to take even more hits then, you just need to avoid those heavy attacks then, so the opposite of how it is now. currently you just block them to make the attacker stumble. with the system i mentioned you would then avoid it to make him stumble instead.

oh, and if there are allready so few tanks left, then why is that? maybe the current system is just bad then? or tanks are just not needed?

[Edit to remove reference of removed content]