They do not "queue" on purpose. Light attacks (LA) are not on the same cooldown that skills are on, so the goal is to do Skill-LA-Skill-LA-Skill-LA-Skill-LA, etc. And that occurs in the same amount of time that you could have done Skill-Skill-Skill-Skill. There is a short global cooldown between skills and the idea is to fill that short cooldown with a LA. If LA were queued like skills then Skill-LA-Skill-LA-Skill-LA-Skill-LA would take twice as long as Skill-Skill-Skill-Skill. No one would be able to do enough damage to get through the tough endgame content that requires you do a certain amount of damage in a certain amount of time.

This is not the most intuitive thing. And it takes practice to understand the exact rhythm and timing of going back and forth between light attacks and skills. But it is an important part of the combat design.

GrizzlyTank wrote: »

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

They do not "queue" on purpose.

Which unfortunately have made it so that anything that has to do with light or heavy attacks feels just really awful and unresponsive to use.

Artim_X wrote: »

You do realize that medium attacks are a thing as well? If a full heavy attack is completed there is nothing left to cancel, a medium attack is just a partial heavy attack, and a light attack is just one tap of the attack button.

Medium attacks are either just a failed heavy attack or a light attack that went for too long.

I firmly disagree with your opinion, since IMHO medium attacks are an important aspect of the game and it is not fun to be stuck in the heavy attack animation.

GrizzlyTank wrote: »

Nor is it fun to deal with two individual combat systems that don't flow together.

In my experience I like being able to either focus on completing a heavy attack or canceling it to do a more important action like avoiding enemy attacks or blocking a potential one-shot. IMO ESO's gameplay feels a lot more fun than the single player games and other MMO's where everything is on a cooldown. ESO's gameplay is right up my alley.

No thank you, the variable nature of light/medium/heavy attacks adds some really interesting nuance to PvP combat

In the wake of the more "true" action combat systems we've seen since this game's release, I do agree that ESO's light and heavy attack system is one of its weakest points.

Artim_X wrote: »

IMHO these attacks should never take priority over a skill, blocking, weapon swap, or rolling. The game as it is now just doesn't work that way. You do realize that medium attacks are a thing as well? If a full heavy attack is completed there is nothing left to cancel, a medium attack is just a partial heavy attack, and a light attack is just one tap of the attack button.

Well considering skills themselves don't take priority over defensive moves, I don't think making basic attacks queue like a skill would include that functionality either. It would just make them more fluid to use, and this game is in desperate need of de-clunking. As far as medium attacks go, they're incredibly lag-prone, they're difficult to use when you can't see your character (Lightning form, for example), and they're left out of all set and skill mechanics that involve using basic attacks. PvP players like to call it "skill," but really it's just a bail out for, "I started an attack I had no business trying, so instead of being punished for it I can just cancel it and get free damage."

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

They do not "queue" on purpose. Light attacks (LA) are not on the same cooldown that skills are on, so the goal is to do Skill-LA-Skill-LA-Skill-LA-Skill-LA, etc. And that occurs in the same amount of time that you could have done Skill-Skill-Skill-Skill. There is a short global cooldown between skills and the idea is to fill that short cooldown with a LA. If LA were queued like skills then Skill-LA-Skill-LA-Skill-LA-Skill-LA would take twice as long as Skill-Skill-Skill-Skill. No one would be able to do enough damage to get through the tough endgame content that requires you do a certain amount of damage in a certain amount of time.

This is not the most intuitive thing. And it takes practice to understand the exact rhythm and timing of going back and forth between light attacks and skills. But it is an important part of the combat design.

It may not queue on purpose, but that has nothing to do with weaving. LAs were always on a separate cooldown because weapons used to have unique cooldowns for basic attacks. The "goal" was never to make players weave, that was a bug they couldn't fix. There's also no reason queuing a light attack would require it to be on the same cooldown as skills in the first place, nor any reason to assume damage wouldn't be adjusted if any changes led to endgame content being impossible to complete. You're right though that it's not intuitive in the slightest. It's not hard to learn, though you'd likely never know to do it unless someone told you. But it is NOT part of the combat design. It is in fact the thing that broke the original combat so bad that no other playstyle can compete anymore.

MentalxHammer wrote: »

No thank you, the variable nature of light/medium/heavy attacks adds some really interesting nuance to PvP combat

Medium attacks in PvP are used basically for two things: 1. To get some damage off from a failed heavy attack, which is kind of broken, or 2. To stun off-balance enemies without using the full heavy animation, which is again broken. There are so many better mechanics they could introduce to maintain that nuance without having broken mechanics that don't properly work half the time.

Artim_X wrote: »

Your comment completely disregards the logic of using a restoration or lightning staff to heavy attack. The beam does multiple ticks before the final tick. In a world where only light and heavy attacks exist with no in-between, these weapons will make no sense as they either do damage from a light attack or wait for the beams final tick to do damage even though the beam is on an enemy doing something. That unique minor damage in-between for these weapons adds variety to to magicka playstyles in relation to fire and ice staves.

One could also argue for other weapons. I start a heavy attack and simply let go of the button. If nothing happens whether I'm using a mace or a fire staff, then what was the point of that small amount of effort. The medium attacks aren't designed to be efficient like light attacks or give any resource like heavies. They help ensure that no player action is wasted and that some damage is still done.

Also everything I said is in relation to both PvE and PvP.

Well the OP is about disregarding the current logic of basic attacks, so I'm okay with that. I do agree though that unique mechanics between weapon types is important. Easy solution with separate hotkeys: While using a Lightning or Restoration staff, holding the heavy attack button will channel a beam attack after the initial heavy.

As far as other weapon types. . . I'm not really seeing your point. You start a heavy attack but release the button before the heavy is charged. Okay? So you stopped performing the action halfway, why should you get anything for that? With the OP's suggestion, at least you'd prevent accidentally cancelling the attack, since just the single button press would trigger the full heavy.