Saber advice for n00bies

[ArtifeX]

I've been reading how a lot of you who are new to JK or fps's in general are having a tough time keeping up with the saber-wielding bots and more experienced online players. In the interest of improving the skill pool, here's some pointers.

 

1. Skill levels - Might sound obvious, but you need to make sure that you've got as many levels of skill as possible in Saber Offense, Defense and Throw if you want to increase your options during a duel. Remember that you have to have Level 3 Offense to use each of the different Saber fighting stances, and Level 3 Defense will keep you alive a lot longer. Also, that 3rd level in Throw is going to let you control your saber while it's in flight.

 

2. Stances - n00bs should not use the light(blue) or heavy(red) saber styles. The light style does very little damage, has very short range, and because of its ability to infinitely chain swings together, it encourages what I call Rabid Saber Syndrome--that is, running directly at your opponent while swinging your saber non-stop. The strong style I only recommend for people with at least a medium skill level. To use it successfully, you have to learn to anticipate, or lead, your target because of the very slow, wide swings that are particular to this stance. It does great damage, so you can dispatch someone with full health and no shields with one hit, but connecting is much more difficult. Recovery is a factor here as well--you'll leave yourself open to attack both before and after a strong swing. Long story short: learn to use the Medium(yellow) style first. It's almost as fast as the light stance, but does much more damage and doesn't leave you so open to counterattack as the strong stance does.

 

3. The Art of Saber Throwing - First rule: never stand still while you throw your saber. Your saber will come back to you wherever you run off to...really. While you're standing still like that you're completely open to any kind of attack. Second rule: if you have a high Throw skill, make sure to turn your view to keep your target in the crosshairs; your saber will follow your movement. Third rule: if someone shows you their back, chuck your saber at it! No one can block a thrown saber (or anything for that matter) while their back is turned. Fortune has smiled on you, make use of it! Lastly: don't forget you can throw your saber while in the air. Try throwing your saber at your opponent ahead of you as you come down from the top of your jump.

 

4. Blocking - Remember Mr. Myagi's advice, "Best way block punch is no be there." This is a proven tactic in JK2. Blocking is usually done by simply looking at your opponent and not attacking. This works great most of the time against a light style or medium style strike, but the strong stance swings will frequently blast through a defensive block and dice you anyway. Plus, when you successfully block a swing, your attacker (for some strange reason that only the designers understand) can follow up their your block with a very quick counterattack. This is counterintuitive to how it should be: the blocker should be able to follow up his block with a free strike as a reward for having the balls to take the hit from a 1 meter long glowing blade aimed at his head, but alas, that's not the way it is. It turns out both people can quickly recover from this and attack, but this becomes kind of a crap-shoot as to who gets carved and who doesn't.

Moral of the story: Don't try to block--just get out of the f#$%ing way and hit him when he's recovering.

 

5. Rolling - Running in any direction (except for diagonals) and hitting the duck key will have your character go into a dive-roll. This is a great way to make up ground on a fleeing opponent or to avoid an incoming swipe, you are completely vulnerable during the roll and during the brief recovery.

 

6. Saber Locks - If you manage to lock sabers with your opponent, don't just stand there, start whacking your primary fire button like mad! He who has a near epileptic siezure in his trigger finger will win the Lock! If you do win, then quickly follow up with a forward+attack downswing to your prone opponent--it'll make an owwie. If you lose, press strafe left or right and hold down your jump key. That'll make sure that you get up as soon as you're able.

 

That pretty much covers the basics. I'll post an advanced level guide a little later.

[grandmasterlee]

Master the horizontal swing.

 

It's the swing you do when strafing left/right in medium or strong stance. You need to learn how to use this while moving in any direction. Practice running forward and quickly releasing forward and tapping strafe in either direction + attack and then resume forward movement. Once you can do this at any time you will fare much better in saber battles.

 

Horizontal swings will hit opponents much more than a straight down or diagonal.

[ArtifeX]

Sorry about the double post--the forum's acting kinda weird.

[txa1265]

... forum is ... um ... a bit busy ...

 

Worth looking twice - good info.

[GalacticBulge]

Excellent advice.

 

One more thing on saber throws.. If you're dealing with someone who is directly in front of you, throwing your saber directly at them may or may not injure them (they may stop to block it, or use Force Push to stop the throw). However, I've found that throwing your saber to the side and past them while backpeddling (backpeddle to increase the distance between your attacker and you.. remember, you're defenseless while the saber is in flight), it is possible to guide your returning saber into their back, which will often result in a kill and a very confused opponent, hehe.

 

This takes practice, but is an effective technique if employed properly. I also use it in singleplayer to mow down opposing troops.

[ArtifeX]

Throwing past a target is definitely a good idea, but you'll have to have level 3 throwing to do it on a moving opponent.

 

It's been pointed out in other threads that the feet are a good open target for blaster fire. It may be possible to throw the saber and hit someone's feet while they're looking straight at you. I'll check that out and let you guys know.

[Caster]

I'm not sure if you're completely invunerable during a roll. Really fast and hard to hit maybe, but not completely invunerable.

 

-Caster

[seanconnery]

I find it rather hard to steer my saber on it's way back...even though I have lvl 3 throw the saber tends to come back to me in a straight line. When I throw the saber in my opponent's face, though, it's always aimed low, at the feet. It fails more times than it works but I find it much easier to hit someone compared to if I aim it at the center of his body.

[Chewie Bakker]

Using medium saber style is good, and even the (I think it's called this) "frenzied monkey" saber strategy works in this style. It also lets you to do the aerial flip/slash that Obi-Wan does to Darth Maul at the start of Duel of the Fates.

 

Using Force push on your enemy as they attempt to do something is a helpful tactic for new saberists. If you knock them down, run up to them with Forward and strafe and do a spinning slash. This should kill them. The wall-flip kick is good for this too.

 

I know there've been posts about the dishonour of killing someone while they're down, but if it was your hard work that took 'em down, I say take the kill if you're a n00b (the game's been out about a week. EVERYONE'S an n00b!).

 

Artifex came up with some pretty good advice, though. Good job.

 

[ric i fieD]

About your stance part..

 

 

In some multiplayer games, they force you to use blue or red colors, so how do you choose medium?

 

Or are you referign to single player?

[Foxbatkllr]

They don't force you to use any of the stances. You may have switched stances by accident. The default way to change stances is by pressing "L". The yellow bar is medium stance.

[Emon]

My advice:

 

When some moron comes charging at you with Dark Rage on and spinning constantly with the light stance, switch to heavy, do a sideways strafe fire and watch they double over.

[Zek]

There's nothing wrong with hitting someone when they're down. It's their fault they left themselves open to be pushed in the first place(if they really didn't like it they'd go Light and use Absorb), and I'm sure as hell not just going to let them get up and make my precious force power go to waste. Take every chance you can get; if they whine about your tactics, tell them they should figure out how to do something about it.