By “unreadable” I’m referring to animations where the start of the swing happens at almost the same time as the end of the attack. Animations that may have an indication that they are coming, but require prior knowledge or guesswork to avoid.
Some examples:
Crucible knight’s plague fire spell
Fire perfectly tracks wherever you are and must be dodge exactly as it is spawned. This attack can come from off-screen, leaving you with only the audio cue that gives you no clear timing for when to dodge. The Echo Knight has a fair version of this that shows an indicator on the ground, and gives you time to move out of it.
Echo Knight’s global shockwaves
When changing to second phase the Echo Knight suddenly deals damage to the whole arena with no sort of cue to react to. This can’t be dodged without having seen it multiple times and guessing the correct time.
Another attack has him thrust his sword into the ground 3 times creating a circle around him. However the damage extends far outside of the circle.
Another mechanic that makes animations harder to read is the jitter effect when hitting an enemy.
The jitter blends together with animations, hiding key motions that tell you an attack is coming. I think reducing the jitter if the enemy doesn’t get stunned or interrupted would make tense situations feel a lot less cluttered.
Also, if an enemy is hit multiple times at once they sometimes shake violently, turning into a complete blur.
The attack animations in this game can’t be called unreadable, they should be called unreadable.This is something that a lot of people complained about at the start of EA, but by now, those who are still left have either found a pattern or changed their attack techniques, in any case they’re all basically used to it, just like apple’s customers, and I don’t know what is so magical about this game that it can be allowed to torment me so much, and I’ve played a few of the Souls games, but they couldn’t get me to tolerate such an outrageous attack animation.I think they probably won’t change the style of this attack animation.
The fire has no travel time. It deals damage along its entire length at the same time. It’s main telegraph is an inhaling sound, however in the first clip the start of the sound is played less than a quarter of a second before I take damage since the enemy was off-screen.
If the fire functioned like a projectile it would feel a lot more fair, giving you time to realize what the enemy is even doing the first time you see it.
My issue with the first attack I mentioned is mainly how it is guaranteed to hit you no matter where you are if you’re not in some sort of invincibility. (I don’t know if blocking works on it.)
I think attacks like this can be fair if you can also avoid them with movement and positioning, rather than just being invincible at the exact right time.
The Echo Knight hitting you from far away with no sort of visual aspect being near your character just feels janky. No attack should make a player think “What hit me?” when they saw the full animation, or not even notice they took damage.
In the second video the enemy is just using its thrust attack. The telegraph for it is when it holds its arm next to its body. But the jitter effect makes its arm stick out away from its body, so I don’t realize its about to attack me.
This attack is tricky. Thankfully they only use it if you run away and create some distance. If you can still see them then you can time you dodge to the time the knight lifts its sword.
