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About this mod
Master Strikes now require precise direction matching, Perfect Blocks require side matching, for both the player and the AI. This means you won't ever get hit with a master strike or perfect block unless you mess up, and getting out of bad situations is hard for both you and the enemy. Be aggressive, but skillfully so!
- Requirements
- Permissions and credits
Installation: Download Better Combat and Immersion Compilation Lite and swap the BetterCombatLite.pak file with this one.
Vanilla combat in Kingdom Come Deliverance only has the illusion of depth. In reality, what direction you aim for (or your enemy aims for) barely matters aside from combos, and the best strategy to win is to use clinches and master strikes. My goal was to put the truth to the lie of the game's original design, and I think I've hit on a way to do exactly that!
This mod starts with the excellent Better Combat and Immersion Compilation Lite as its base and uses the directional Perfect Block system found in Combat Overhaul as well as tweaking group enemy AI back to normal attack frequency and the master strike/perfect block windows back to their vanilla values. Read the descriptions of those two mods to understand what you're in for with this modified version. In essence, you won't be one-shotting enemies easily anymore (but still doing respectable damage, don't worry!), and you don't have to worry about combat just being a boring parry/riposte back-and-forth or just sitting around waiting for Master Strikes. You have to put some thought into what you're doing, but it's possible to win swordfights on skill alone, and very quickly (which also means you can take out groups much more easily now, especially without Perfect Blocks locking Henry in place all the time!)
What this accomplishes is that if you hit the Block button during an enemy attack, during the Master Strike window of opportunity, but you're not matching their attack side, Henry will fail to defend himself at all. Likewise if you attempt a Perfect Block but you aren't matching the foe's side. This makes breaking out of enemy chain attacks very difficult, and attacking into an enemy sector very dangerous (because they will quite often master strike/parry you, and ripostes are very hard to deal with since you have to quickly match their direction and parry them). You're going to have to watch where enemy attacks come from very carefully and learn to react incredibly fast to keep Henry alive.
The same goes for the enemies, though! Thanks to the AI adjustments of Better Combat, the AI is now very prone to feints and direction changes, making them dangerous to attack, and they dodge and parry whenever the opportunity presents itself. That means a single bad attack could result in your getting hit with a riposte and locked into a chain of devastating hits - you'll probably rely on the dodge more than ever with this mod setup, so the Light Armor perk actually has a reason to exist!
If you aim for your attacks for the enemy's uncovered sector, you can often score a hit (or at least a regular block) and either launch into a combo or simply batter the enemy down. It's not all roses and sunshine; very often the AI will suddenly change attack vectors and parry you if you try this, so be prepared to bail out if your offensive fails. Group combat is much more manageable now; if you're aggressive and careful about where you throw your attacks, you can dispatch enemies very quickly and even the odds. I suggest using a weapon without a shield if you want to be able to tell what stance an enemy is in if they're sprinting at you; by tapping Block, Henry will automatically mirror the foe's stance, even if that stance isn't visible during the sprint animation. Use that to plan your assault against aggressive groups!
Every combo now serves a different tactical purpose, since direction matters a lot. I'll iterate over how the different Longsword combos interact with this system here; I'm not as conversant with the other weapons' combos, but a lot of the same logic should apply.
The False Edge combo that Bernard teaches you is an incredible tool, because it's practically guaranteed to work (aside from enemies dodging out of it, which is a risk with all chain attacks) if the enemy is stanced down and to your left; they can't Perfect Block the vertical or top-right strikes from that stance, and the third strike automatically hits after that, which makes the combo very safe if they're in that stance. Note that despite what the game claims, the False Edge combo WORKS WITH SHORTSWORDS, AS LONG AS YOU DON'T HAVE A SHIELD EQUIPPED.
Thrusts can be dangerous in this system, which makes the Scarmaker more difficult to use, but remember that while they can be Perfect Blocked from any direction, the same doesn't go for Master Strikes; high stance can't Master Strike a medium thrust and a high thrust can only suffer a Master Strike from high stance. Use this to your advantage and alternate medium/high thrusts to make Scarmaker more reliable and get some damage to your foe's face! With the Better Combat alterations, open-faced helmets don't protect the face at all, so this is often a fight-ender.
Run Through has always been a useful combo for group fights, and it shines with this setup. If you can get the initial thrust off (remember to use a high thrust if the enemy's guard isn't high), the combo usually comes off, and with the enemy on the ground you can focus on their allies. Watch out if the enemy is in a high-left stance, though! You might get a Master Strike from them during the second blow. It's better if they're in a right-side stance when you try this one, and ideally stunned from a clinch or combo (riposting with a thrust will work in a pinch)
Wrath Strike starts with a high-left strike, which is a stance you'll often hang out in defensively. If you were covering the left, and the enemy suddenly swaps to the right, this combo can come out very naturally as long as they aren't in the bottom-right (which could mean a Master Strike for you on the second blow). It's a solid choice if you want to start a combo from the left and don't want the thrust risk of Scarmaker; if the enemy IS in bottom-right stance, use Duplieren instead!
Duplieren was initially one of my least-used combos, because the prevalence of Master Strikes and Perfect Blocks made it nearly impossible to actually trigger. Now, it's one of the best. If the enemy is hanging out in a low right guard, or you can provoke them into normal-blocking any of your hits, Duplieren is nearly guaranteed to go off without a hitch and send the enemy on a one-way trip to Hell. The fact that it cuts at the face, which many enemies lack protection for, is exceptionally useful; it also pushes enemies out of formation (very useful in group fights) and Henry travels with them, making it a decent way to evade rear attacks while you pummel an enemy into submission. Plus, moving with the enemy means Henry can almost instantly follow it up with more attacks to finish the job! Just, an exceptionally good combo all around; learn to pounce with it every time the enemy is in bottom-right guard, and aside from them dodging out of it, you'll rarely have cause to regret attempting it. It's the highest-level combo in the game, and with this mod setup, it sure feels like it belongs there!
Drei Wunder: Wrist has always been a very risky combo, and this mod doesn't entirely alleviate that. While the first two cuts (bottom-left and top-right) are safe enough, the third strike (of this four-hit combo) is a thrust, which can be very dangerous. To avoid master strikes, you should generally make it a high thrust (which also means it might do exceptional damage if the foe's face is unguarded), but the enemy will often Perfect Block that third hit. If they don't, though, injuring their hands might just take them out of the fight! If your weapon has high Blunt damage (quite rare for a longsword), attacking the foe's hands is also even more effective; very few armor setups provide more than negligible blunt defense to the hands. This combo is high-risk and high-reward at the best of times, but it's well worth using if your foe has poor hand protection (as many enemies do in this game).
No combo is ever perfectly guaranteed to go off, even if the enemy doesn't dodge (aside from False Edge against a bottom-left guard, and even then the enemy may change guards mid-combo), but by following this logic you can skyrocket your chances of pulling them off. Once the opening cut of a combo has landed, you only need to land one more strike to seal the deal for the deal for three-hit combos. Try different strategies against different guards, and lure your enemy into bad guards so you can combo them reliably. Learn what stance the enemy ends up in after different perfect blocks, master strikes, and clinches, and figure out which combos exploit those stances. That's the key to taking foes down quickly - and taking foes down quickly is necessary, both when fighting groups, and simply to stay alive! Offense is the best defense in this mod setup, and letting an enemy stick around and attack you for a while is almost guaranteed to eventually cause you to mess up your defensive inputs and take a massive chain-strike, possibly dooming our favorite blacksmith's son.
All thanks go to EkErilaz and machinegod420 for their exceptional work in making all of this possible. This is my first time posting a mod here, and I haven't modded for Kingdom Come before - this mod could use substantial improvement in terms of how the AI reacts to chain-strikes and so forth, but so far this is the best combat experience I've had with this game. I may seek to improve it further down the line if I learn more about how KC:D is programmed or someone offers to assist. I'm sharing my configuration by request of bluephoenix on the BCAIC forum.
Vanilla combat in Kingdom Come Deliverance only has the illusion of depth. In reality, what direction you aim for (or your enemy aims for) barely matters aside from combos, and the best strategy to win is to use clinches and master strikes. My goal was to put the truth to the lie of the game's original design, and I think I've hit on a way to do exactly that!
This mod starts with the excellent Better Combat and Immersion Compilation Lite as its base and uses the directional Perfect Block system found in Combat Overhaul as well as tweaking group enemy AI back to normal attack frequency and the master strike/perfect block windows back to their vanilla values. Read the descriptions of those two mods to understand what you're in for with this modified version. In essence, you won't be one-shotting enemies easily anymore (but still doing respectable damage, don't worry!), and you don't have to worry about combat just being a boring parry/riposte back-and-forth or just sitting around waiting for Master Strikes. You have to put some thought into what you're doing, but it's possible to win swordfights on skill alone, and very quickly (which also means you can take out groups much more easily now, especially without Perfect Blocks locking Henry in place all the time!)
What this accomplishes is that if you hit the Block button during an enemy attack, during the Master Strike window of opportunity, but you're not matching their attack side, Henry will fail to defend himself at all. Likewise if you attempt a Perfect Block but you aren't matching the foe's side. This makes breaking out of enemy chain attacks very difficult, and attacking into an enemy sector very dangerous (because they will quite often master strike/parry you, and ripostes are very hard to deal with since you have to quickly match their direction and parry them). You're going to have to watch where enemy attacks come from very carefully and learn to react incredibly fast to keep Henry alive.
The same goes for the enemies, though! Thanks to the AI adjustments of Better Combat, the AI is now very prone to feints and direction changes, making them dangerous to attack, and they dodge and parry whenever the opportunity presents itself. That means a single bad attack could result in your getting hit with a riposte and locked into a chain of devastating hits - you'll probably rely on the dodge more than ever with this mod setup, so the Light Armor perk actually has a reason to exist!
If you aim for your attacks for the enemy's uncovered sector, you can often score a hit (or at least a regular block) and either launch into a combo or simply batter the enemy down. It's not all roses and sunshine; very often the AI will suddenly change attack vectors and parry you if you try this, so be prepared to bail out if your offensive fails. Group combat is much more manageable now; if you're aggressive and careful about where you throw your attacks, you can dispatch enemies very quickly and even the odds. I suggest using a weapon without a shield if you want to be able to tell what stance an enemy is in if they're sprinting at you; by tapping Block, Henry will automatically mirror the foe's stance, even if that stance isn't visible during the sprint animation. Use that to plan your assault against aggressive groups!
Every combo now serves a different tactical purpose, since direction matters a lot. I'll iterate over how the different Longsword combos interact with this system here; I'm not as conversant with the other weapons' combos, but a lot of the same logic should apply.
The False Edge combo that Bernard teaches you is an incredible tool, because it's practically guaranteed to work (aside from enemies dodging out of it, which is a risk with all chain attacks) if the enemy is stanced down and to your left; they can't Perfect Block the vertical or top-right strikes from that stance, and the third strike automatically hits after that, which makes the combo very safe if they're in that stance. Note that despite what the game claims, the False Edge combo WORKS WITH SHORTSWORDS, AS LONG AS YOU DON'T HAVE A SHIELD EQUIPPED.
Thrusts can be dangerous in this system, which makes the Scarmaker more difficult to use, but remember that while they can be Perfect Blocked from any direction, the same doesn't go for Master Strikes; high stance can't Master Strike a medium thrust and a high thrust can only suffer a Master Strike from high stance. Use this to your advantage and alternate medium/high thrusts to make Scarmaker more reliable and get some damage to your foe's face! With the Better Combat alterations, open-faced helmets don't protect the face at all, so this is often a fight-ender.
Run Through has always been a useful combo for group fights, and it shines with this setup. If you can get the initial thrust off (remember to use a high thrust if the enemy's guard isn't high), the combo usually comes off, and with the enemy on the ground you can focus on their allies. Watch out if the enemy is in a high-left stance, though! You might get a Master Strike from them during the second blow. It's better if they're in a right-side stance when you try this one, and ideally stunned from a clinch or combo (riposting with a thrust will work in a pinch)
Wrath Strike starts with a high-left strike, which is a stance you'll often hang out in defensively. If you were covering the left, and the enemy suddenly swaps to the right, this combo can come out very naturally as long as they aren't in the bottom-right (which could mean a Master Strike for you on the second blow). It's a solid choice if you want to start a combo from the left and don't want the thrust risk of Scarmaker; if the enemy IS in bottom-right stance, use Duplieren instead!
Duplieren was initially one of my least-used combos, because the prevalence of Master Strikes and Perfect Blocks made it nearly impossible to actually trigger. Now, it's one of the best. If the enemy is hanging out in a low right guard, or you can provoke them into normal-blocking any of your hits, Duplieren is nearly guaranteed to go off without a hitch and send the enemy on a one-way trip to Hell. The fact that it cuts at the face, which many enemies lack protection for, is exceptionally useful; it also pushes enemies out of formation (very useful in group fights) and Henry travels with them, making it a decent way to evade rear attacks while you pummel an enemy into submission. Plus, moving with the enemy means Henry can almost instantly follow it up with more attacks to finish the job! Just, an exceptionally good combo all around; learn to pounce with it every time the enemy is in bottom-right guard, and aside from them dodging out of it, you'll rarely have cause to regret attempting it. It's the highest-level combo in the game, and with this mod setup, it sure feels like it belongs there!
Drei Wunder: Wrist has always been a very risky combo, and this mod doesn't entirely alleviate that. While the first two cuts (bottom-left and top-right) are safe enough, the third strike (of this four-hit combo) is a thrust, which can be very dangerous. To avoid master strikes, you should generally make it a high thrust (which also means it might do exceptional damage if the foe's face is unguarded), but the enemy will often Perfect Block that third hit. If they don't, though, injuring their hands might just take them out of the fight! If your weapon has high Blunt damage (quite rare for a longsword), attacking the foe's hands is also even more effective; very few armor setups provide more than negligible blunt defense to the hands. This combo is high-risk and high-reward at the best of times, but it's well worth using if your foe has poor hand protection (as many enemies do in this game).
No combo is ever perfectly guaranteed to go off, even if the enemy doesn't dodge (aside from False Edge against a bottom-left guard, and even then the enemy may change guards mid-combo), but by following this logic you can skyrocket your chances of pulling them off. Once the opening cut of a combo has landed, you only need to land one more strike to seal the deal for the deal for three-hit combos. Try different strategies against different guards, and lure your enemy into bad guards so you can combo them reliably. Learn what stance the enemy ends up in after different perfect blocks, master strikes, and clinches, and figure out which combos exploit those stances. That's the key to taking foes down quickly - and taking foes down quickly is necessary, both when fighting groups, and simply to stay alive! Offense is the best defense in this mod setup, and letting an enemy stick around and attack you for a while is almost guaranteed to eventually cause you to mess up your defensive inputs and take a massive chain-strike, possibly dooming our favorite blacksmith's son.
All thanks go to EkErilaz and machinegod420 for their exceptional work in making all of this possible. This is my first time posting a mod here, and I haven't modded for Kingdom Come before - this mod could use substantial improvement in terms of how the AI reacts to chain-strikes and so forth, but so far this is the best combat experience I've had with this game. I may seek to improve it further down the line if I learn more about how KC:D is programmed or someone offers to assist. I'm sharing my configuration by request of bluephoenix on the BCAIC forum.