The Basics

Each weapon type has its own skill level. These combat skill levels are important because each weapon has a hidden weapon scaling stat. This means it’s often better to stick with a weapon which you are skilled in using, rather than switching to the latest and greatest weapon that the weaponsmith can produce. Soon enough the weaponsmith will be able to make a better version of the weapon type you are currently using, and by that time your skill with it will be even higher!

There are three different melee damage types, and each enemy will have different resistances to them. Armors and foods (and maybe someday potions) provide these resistances to us!

Attacking

Regular attacks can be performed by pressing LeftMouse. Notably performing a regular attack does not consume or require stamina. There is never any friendly fire in the game; so attack away!

With the exception of a few unique magical swords, every weapon of a single type shares a unique special attack which can be performed by pressing CTRL-LeftMouse. Note that these special attacks consume stamina and have a cooldown before they may be used again.

Example: Sword's special attack:


esistances and the variety of special attacks it will be important for the kingdom to have skilled users for each weapon type.

Blocking

With the exception of great weapons (greatswords/greatmauls/greataxes) and polearms, all weapons are one handed and thus allow you to utilize a shield (or light source) while wielding them. Shielding is very important in combat. Holding RightMouse will raise your shield and allow you to directionally block incoming damage. Each time you block damage by shielding some of the damage you would otherwise take is instead drained from your stamina. Blocking is also a skill. Higher levels of block allow you to block higher quantities of incoming damage. If your block skill is not high enough to block the entirety of an attack you will take the stamina hit and any unblocked damage will spill over to your health. It is likely that higher levels of block also reduce the stamina lost when blocking damage, but I have not verified this.

Pressing CTRL-RightMouse will perform an AOE shield bash which will stun nearby enemies for a brief period of time (~1 second), and deal a bit of damage to them. Shield bashes consume stamina and have a cooldown, just like special attacks!

Putting it all together

Opening with a shield bash followed by a special attack allows you to get good damage in early and starts your cooldowns immediately, allowing for them to be used again as soon as possible.

Enemies have special attacks of their own! A white glint in the eye of enemy means they are about to perform a special attack. This often means it’s a good time to block or stun them; however, some enemies have special attacks which perform an AOE stun of their own which can even affect players who are blocking.

When fighting a single enemy

It’s easy to block their attack, respond with your own, and repeat.

When fighting multiple enemies

Their attacks will likely be unsynchronized, making it nearly impossible to block all incoming attacks and respond with your own.

When possible, try to aggro a single enemy to isolate them. If you accidentally aggro a group you can often retreat until they start to deaggro, while staying close enough to either maintain aggro on one or to reinitiate aggro on an enemy which separated from the group while chasing you.
We’ve found that shooting arrows at the ground near an enemy will often allow you to aggro only the closest enemy, even while others are relatively close by.

When fighting a group solo you don’t have many options other than using your cooldowns when available and spamming normal attacks. Once you’ve whittled them down to a single enemy you can return to alternating blocking and attacking.

When fighting archers

Certain enemies will attack you with arrows so long as you are far enough away. If you get too close they’ll switch to a knife to stab you, or sometimes even bash you with their bow.
Their arrows are very easy to dodge, so the most effective way to kill them is to dodge their arrow, then respond with one of your own.

When fighting with a group

Shield bashes can be performed in a sequence to stun-lock enemies. While in a party the list of players can be used as the order players should perform their shield bashes. As the group approaches the enemy the first player in the party list performs a shield bash and says “Stun 1”. After about a second the next player performs a shield bash and says “Stun 2”. This sequence continues while the rest of the players utilize their primary and special attacks to kill the enemy.

If the enemy is still alive and everyone’s shield bashes are on cooldown it’s time to watch your health. If you are taking damage from the enemy then it’s time to hold up your shield while the rest of the party continues to wail on them. If your health begins to get uncomfortably low you can often strafe backward while continuing to shield and the arrgo will switch to someone else. If at any time you are struggling to pass through your teammates unequipping your weapon should allow you to clip past them.

There is a notion of threat in the game, which determines which player will pull aggro. We’ve found that the player dealing the highest damage seems to generate the highest threat. There are also certain magic items which focus on the generation of threat. We suspect that special attacks generate high threat as well (likely due to their high damage); so if the person shielding is trying to retreat it’s likely that the next person to use a special attack will gain aggro.

Did you say MAGIC?

Magic spells can be unlocked by equipping armor (cloth, leather, or metal) which was crafted using relics.

Relics are dropped by named enemies. Named enemies can be easily identified because their names are capitalized as though they are proper nouns.

Examples:

Inquisitor Veritatis is a named enemy, while inquisition herald and inquisitor scout are not.

Once you’ve equipped a piece of magic gear, the spell can be equipped into one of the CTRL-1 through CTRL-5 spell slots by right clicking on the spell slot in your inventory.
Spells consume stamina to use and have a cooldown, just like special attacks and shield bashes!

There are also magic weapons in the game. Most of these have passive effects, with the exception of some magic swords which instead have an alternate special attack.

Lets party!

Parties can be formed either by looking at another player and using the scroll wheel to select Invite to party and pressing F, or by typing /invite <player name> in chat. Pressing P will bring up the party menu where you can manage your party.