I think spears are considered to be too 'plain' which is a shame. Most MMO's in general neglect spears for some reason.

I can see it now, equip a spear and everyone looks like a Templar.

Casdha wrote: »

I can see it now, equip a spear and everyone looks like a Templar.

Templars do not use spears. They are light sabre toothpicks.

Effort

red_emu wrote: »

Casdha wrote: »

I can see it now, equip a spear and everyone looks like a Templar.

Templars do not use spears. They are light sabre toothpicks.

Picture the same animation with a different graphic model

Edziu wrote: »

I have something interessing:

go to Skywatch in Aurridion to fighters guild, just outside you will see two couples of training fighters and all 4 of them are using spears and if you look for some time at then you will notice they have atleast 5 different animations to use like for full skilline

Yep! Noticed that too!

There also seems to be quite a few nudges towards unarmed combat, dotted around Elsweyr.

I have a strong suspicion that we will see the following, eventually:

1. Spear/Bo staff
2. Unarmed combat
3. Whips (1h and DW lines)

Dusk_Coven wrote: »

There are spears in-game as cosmetic items / non-interactable furniture objects, but spears haven't been playable since Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind. What happened?

This has been asked multiple times, on a semi regular basis. Sadly no spears to date. It does not look likely.

When I think of spear combat... I'm thinking Oberyn Martel (The Viper) from Game of Thrones. Fast, sweeping, attacks, at a distance. I think it can be done and be an interesting skill line.

However, on balance, I do not think ESO needs another stamina weapon line. What it needs is an alternative Magica "weapon" skill line, because right now we have... Staffs. Thats it, 2 skill lines of which only one is DPS skill line.

Meanwhile Stamina has several stamina weapon skill lines, and several different types of weapons within these for variety and effect.

Some have suggested a "no weapon", magica skill line, using ones hands, or perhaps wielding awesome looking spell books in one hand.

Dusk_Coven wrote: »

LennoxPoodle wrote: »

It's not that bad that they aren't in though. It's a big bulky weapon of war and not a sidearm suited for an adventurer.

Unless they're saving it for an eastern tradition skill line where it is more staff than western style pike/polearm. In such a case they could combine it with staff fighting and make the various types of polearms into mere motifs. That Hakoshae Festival costume picture has a Japanese-y background that hints at some future expansion in that style.

The issue is less the way the weapon is wielded and more how it can be carried. Some shields and 2h weapons already break that "rule" tough. IRL great swords for example were something you took into battle, but nothing you carried around on your body all the time (IIRC there was never any carrying contraption or sheath for these things. Were probably just wrapped in cloth and shouldered or put on a mule or wagon). The same applies to spears, pike halberds and such.

Anyway, going by either western or eastern specifically is a bad idea. Both have polearm and staff (Bo- versus quarterstaff for example) traditions. I don't expect a Yari to be used very differently from a typical European spear. Dragonknight animations could be made a bit more Asian martial arts like though.

Vildebill wrote: »

I think spear would fit under 2h weapons to have a weapon to give crit, like daggers do on dual wield.

How the dizzying swing animation would work with a spear though, I don't know

Again, longswords would fit that better. By that I don't mean the things Dungeons and Dragons + TES I-IV classify as such, but the actual thing. For those who don't know: Compared to a "regular one handed sword" (arming sword) they have a slightly longer longer blade and significantly longer hilt allowing the user much more control (->crit) and can still comfortably be carried on the hip (usually). Famous pop cultural examples would be Anduril and most swords in the Witcher series. You could compare them to Katanas and Tachis I guess. One cool thing about them (and maybe reason for their development?) is halfswording, a technique emulating the precision of a Dagger, for hitting gaps in the enemies armor. (->crit again)
They fit the 2H animations significantly better than spears. Even designing them shouldn't be to hard. They can be heavily based on the 1H swords

Here is an example:

LennoxPoodle wrote: »

Spears would work better as a control and aoe based tanking weapon anyway.

Considering spears are weapons you thrust into an enemy, I fail to see how they would be AoE weapons. Unless they have some pierce-through mechanic, then they would have some sort of line-AoE, but that's it.

Brittney want's to know too.

Spears are the foundation of ancient infantry, in every society that fielded an army. Spears have a tremendous advantage over swords and shorter weapons. Martial arts with spears are elegant, there is nothing unrefined about a spear in skilled hands. There are some derogatory terms associated with spears but I can't see that being an obstacle. If I were to choose 2 weapons to fight in close quarters with it would be a long spear and a short mace in reserve. Spear combat is unlike other 2h/1h+s weapons, it is based around puncturing, defensive counters and to a much lesser degree slashing. It could easily justify 2 weapon skill, a 2h long spear line and a 1h+s short spear line.

Not having spears in this game is a tremendous missed opportunity.

Historically, spears have excelled as a phalanx, rather than as an individual combat weapon. Putting them in the game would demand doing multi-player animations that would take the game-play into a completely different direction. Not directly, maybe, but it's the thin end of a wedge that is better avoided.

Most combat has the light attack (which uses the individual weapon animation) cancelled by the skill use, so 2h, DW, S7B or Spear is almost irrelevant to the individual character anyway. It's only when a skill has an animation using the weapon that it becomes significant, and those are typically skills of that weapon line. To some extent, the Templar skills are the spear line in that respect.

And spear in the TES games has often mixed in generic pole-arms that should have very different animations from spears, such as halberds and long-hammers. Again, adding spear alone would just cause demand for the other pole-arms.