Thoughts on Light Attack Weaving Amid ESO's Exciting 2026 Roadmap

Twohothardware · February 27

I'd like to see light/heavy attack animations overhauled like they're doing with DK and the other classes. Not just sped up animations like they tried to do here recently but actual new animations/sounds. Light and heavy attacks should look more weighted and intentional and damaging when they connect instead of floaty like they are now.

zammo · February 28

Suddwrath wrote: »

Light attack weaving is dumb and one of the worst aspects of ESO’s combat. On a similar note, heavy attacks are confusing from a series perspective…HA to RESTORE resources, really? It should have been the reverse. Light attacks should have been resource recoverer (not weaving, just light attacks) while heavy attacks were a resource spending option for DPS. Bad decisions were made when designing the combat and then ZOS just stuck with them.

Erm, the ZOS combat team are outside and would like a word. This is entirely on the community.

Rungar · February 28

light and heavy attacks should be reactionary only when you have an opening, not for general dps/weaving. The resource restore shouldnt be gauranteed.

slottable light and heavy attack skills that have focus on a single condition to exploit, and causing that condition with regular skills and then exploiting that condition is where the resource gain and dps should occur.

how they do it now is just dumb and boring busywork and thats why people dont care for it. So easy to fix.

Major_Mangle · February 28

exiars10 wrote: »

Of course ESO minority who managed to do properly initially just bug is in its own bubble and defend it .
The worst mistake devs did was to cater to them.

Outside the bubble, ESO is the most notorious for the worst combat in any MMO.
Just go read anywhere outside bubble in the last 10 years, and it's almost always that the combat is the ranked as the worst aspect of the game.
It goes like this "I would play ESO / I tried it but combat is horrible" or similar adjectives.

For me personally, combat is mostly terrible (LA weaing is just one part), and that doesn't include just playing as DD - tanking is even worse. Probably the worst aspect of game (excluding hundreds bugs) for me.

People who never experience another combat system than the old school WoW/lotro (or similar "long cooldown" snore fest combat) are usually the ones complaining about ESO´s combat. For what reason I can´t say. I personally love it and think it´s one of the best ones out there. The echo chambers of reddit or other MMO forums are similar "bubbles" as the ones you claim the ESO population lives in.

ESO´s combat system at its core is fine and honestly one of the best one in the MMO market.

NxJoeyD · March 30

I would be more subscribed to LA weaving if the Devs were to streamline skill animations to make them more consistent in terms of the time it takes the animations to complete.

Weaving light attacks between skills can be a viable mechanic but given the state of the server / latency as well as huge disparity between skill animation durations weaving doesn’t necessarily represent a polished mechanic.

Server latency aside, choosing to weave light attacks in between skills that are animated to execute blisteringly quick will yield a much more effective result than weaving light attacks between skills that have clunky or slow animations.

If all skills had animation durations that were consistent, not necessarily identical but within < 0.5s then I think we’d be in a better place to talk about the mechanical aspect of weaving as a game staple.

Weaving isn’t essential in gameplay, IMO contributing to a max of around 15% or so DPS swings in PvE. In PvP it becomes even more questionable as with subclassing, builds tend to cherry pick those skills which the Devs gave really quick animations and high scaling, enabling better weave potential and output, while others weave as effectively.

It’s another example of a mechanic that’s a solid idea but just isn’t well implanted in game. The games other mechanics don’t align in a way that creates a baseline for broad waving.