Compiled: All Saber Fighting Moves (huge text post)

[ACGe0rge]

I forgot to mention that overall, I liked your post. It had some good info and should be helpful to all who read it. I just disagree with you on that one point.

[ArtifeX]

Guys, I've made a bunch of additions and corrections. You'll want to check out my findings in the new Saber Defense (blocking) section. I think some of you will be dismayed.

 

I'll reiterate that the Medium style does take more skill to be successful with, but only because it is intrinsically weaker than the Strong stance. It's pretty, and it's a lot of fun, but you just won't kill an experienced Strong stance player consistently with it. You may get a kill or two, but in the long run you'll come out with the short end of the stick.

 

Anyway, check the post again for some new stuff.

[Jedith]

the stances aren't imbalanced. you're just not using it the way you should be.

i think, the beta testers would notify raven and tell them it's imbalanced, but this is the way it is. live with it and stop whining.

[UseDaAgression]

I don't think light is useless either... If you hit someone wit heavy then just goto light and finish them off.... and the medium spiecial deserves more credit than you give it... You can keep the tip pointed at them on landing and they really cant get near you. And like said above ^^^ I almost died when u said heavy was the choice of good players lol

[Bacon00]

heavy stance - powerful, but easily avoidable and leaves the person open to couter attack for long periods of time (thus, it deminishes it's powerfulness if the opponent knows what they are doing.)

 

light stance - not useless. You have to have good reflexes to get the quick spins and small hacks to hit. Definatly not useless. I use it a lot, and I get a decent amount of kills against heavy stancers.

 

medium stance - good, but I prefer the light/heavy combo myself.

 

Otherwise, excellent post. Although you do tend to lable moves "newbie moves" rather often.... if it works, if it kills people, it's not a newbie move. It means that you haven't figure out how to block it/get away from it yet... making YOU the "newbie." If a newbie can kill you with his "newbie move," then you must suck worse than him, since the "newbie move" is killing YOU.

 

Shooting a gun kills people. Newbies shoot a gun. Thus, shooting a gun must be a "newbie move," right??

 

Sorry.. it's just that all this newbie talk makes me laugh/makes me angry at the same time.

[dkc4C]

You guys seem to equate "score" with "skill" which, in the case of that ridiculously overpowered style, is absolutely not the case.

 

Yes, most people do equate "score" with "skill." I'm sure everyone will acknowledge your superior skill if you are last place in Kills.

[Vorax]

Originally posted by ArtifeX

Guys, I've made a bunch of additions and corrections. You'll want to check out my findings in the new Saber Defense (blocking) section. I think some of you will be dismayed.

 

I'll reiterate that the Medium style does take more skill to be successful with, but only because it is intrinsically weaker than the Strong stance. It's pretty, and it's a lot of fun, but you just won't kill an experienced Strong stance player consistently with it. You may get a kill or two, but in the long run you'll come out with the short end of the stick.

 

Anyway, check the post again for some new stuff.

 

Only true if the strong stance is using heal, otherwise they just can't strike fast enough. You must agree a medium stance user has a much better chance of hitting you 3 times then a strong stance does even once. 3 is all it takes. With the right hits, it only take 2 time with medium. If someone is using heal however, I will agree, that you have to use strong against them, just because they just keep healing and the game goes forever. But, not always. If the medium stance guy is using drain, he will take the strong stance guy as if he didn't have the heal and again, the fight is over in 2-3 hits, easily landed with the medium stance.

 

I feel I have to break this to all the Light and Medium stance proponents out there: there's yet another reason not to use your styles. A player can render himself completely invulnerable to your Light Style attacks and about 90% resistant to Medium attacks simply by getting level 3 saber defense, squatting in a corner and facing you. That 10% of Medium that will hit is the finishing move (sometimes) and the occasional swing that gets a bit behind him. I did this over and over again to verify it, and I am sorry to say it's true. This even works against many of the Strong stance swings, although you can break the defense nearly 100% if you get extremely close. That's because the swing's range is so great that the saber ends up behind the opponent and effectively gets them in the back. I actually killed myself on my assistants immobile outstretched blade while trying to score a hit with Light Stance. Did we need any more reasons not to use it? There are two exceptions to this: The light stance backstab is completely unblockable when your opponent is crouched, and the Light Stance lunge move can break through maybe 5% of the time.

 

Most people use level 3 saber defense. It does not stop anyone from connecting with light or medium once they swing. Unless the guy can swing really fast...umm...wait your right. Light and medium are better then strong. Try fighting someone that is moving. Your point might be true for attacking someone who is away from their computer or getting a connection loss, but other then that, people move in the game. If they are using strong, they are that much easier to hit.

 

Hiding in the corner is hardly a show stopper for light or medium. So many people try this with me...once Several ways around it. With medium: Just jump, from slightly farther back then normal and slash down. Wack. With light stance, do a roll towards them, then slash. Both can easily stop the hide in the corner and crouch guys. If you have pull, you can also drag them out of there. With push, taunt with your saber a bit, till they try to swing that big clunky strong stance...or any stance, then just push them over and kill them.

 

- Vorax

[Vestril]

I just wanted to express my impressed happiness over the lack of flaming going on in this thread, I read maybe one or two posts by immature people and they were just ignored--it's given me hope for Saber enthusiasts!

 

As for Saber combat I find that my timing is just not good enough for Strong Stance, I seem to have an intuitive understanding for the timing of medium stance, when I let myself go I have no trouble killing just about anyone on a server without taking any hits. Of course it doesn't always work that way of course lol. I usually get sloppy and start thinking too much and get chopped by whoever I happen to be playing, newbie or experienced player... Anyway thank you people of this post for being so respectful and polite, and thank you ArtifeX for taking the time to test, compile, and post this info =)

 

Ian

[Lazarous]

My observations from playing multi-

Heavy stance, to me, is more useful for one simple reason - healing (and drain). Light and medium in general get more hit in because of their speed of attack...however, those hits become meaningless as the person you're attacking heals away the damage nearly instantly. This single fact is what makes strong stance seem overpowered. A strong stance needs to get 1(maybe 2) solid hits in and the other guy is dead. A medium stance user has to get at a minimum 3 clean hits to even hope of killing someone. What this means is that medium stance is more suited to 'bleeding' an enemy down slowly, but surely. Strong stance is extremely hard to use against someone with this mentality. In a no force setting, i would personally take either light or medium against a strong stance, because of what i feel is its more assured chance to hit.

 

I'm ambivilant about light stance. One the one had it has some extremely fast combos as well as the ability to chain the forward lunge into almost any point in your attack (note - switching to walking while doing this makes the timing MUCH easier, i.e. hitting the shift key). On the other is the fact that it is in great part a headless chicken style. Its quite simply hard to move in a methodical, controlled way with this style. I don't think a range increase to at least match medium would overbalance this style in the least.

 

 

There is one thing that i believe everyone should note - medium and heavy stances cost force points...a lot of force points. Given that, wouldn't it make sense that the heavy stance(which costs 8 points by itself i think) would be the most powerful of all the types of combat? If the cost system for styles was different, i would have no qualms about completely balancing the styles, but as is if a person can kill a strong stance user reliably with light stance at an equal skill level, that would mean the heavy stance user wasted something like 12 force points (a not inconsiderable amount).

 

Bearing that in mind, i agree with the suggestion that the styles should have the same damage and range (the length of the saber) but simply have different chances to break through defences. Also make the styles inherent in all characters and make additional points into saber offense increase damage, speed and chance to overcome a block.

 

 

Laz

[Soul-Burn]

For all of you saying that: "I usually kill Heavy users really easily because they are so open for attack".

 

That's because you are playing with really unexperienced people. One of the big advantages of the Strong style, is the range. You can swing the saber, and if u keep enough range from your enemy, you will never get hit, while you can actually land a move.

[Vestril]

For all of you saying that: "I usually kill Heavy users really easily because they are so open for attack".

That's because you are playing with really unexperienced people. One of the big advantages of the Strong style, is the range. You can swing the saber, and if u keep enough range from your enemy, you will never get hit, while you can actually land a move.

 

Or it's because it leaves you open...sometimes. It's all a matter of patience with a strong player vs. anyone good. I, for example, usually play medium stance, and I just wait for that moment where their Saber is in the wrong place and mine is near the right place. Patience is a big key there, and it's unfair and rather silly to assume we're all playing unexperienced people, I've played on a number of servers and against people with various levels of skill and there is no one stance that beats me regularly (of medium and heavy...light only beats me after strong (as in he hit me once with strong, then again with light to finish me off...a clever strategy))

[ArtifeX]

Originally posted by Bacon00

 

Otherwise, excellent post. Although you do tend to lable moves "newbie moves" rather often.... if it works, if it kills people, it's not a newbie move. It means that you haven't figure out how to block it/get away from it yet... making YOU the "newbie." If a newbie can kill you with his "newbie move," then you must suck worse than him, since the "newbie move" is killing YOU.

 

I did say that newbies will commonly spam the Strong finisher for a while once they learn it. I didn't say that I have trouble countering it; I actually gave advice on how to do so. I did say that I think the Light style tends to be used by newbies because they think it looks cool, but that hardly means that I think the style is dangerous and that I can't defend against it. Please refer to the new section on Saber Defense.

 

In general, I think you misunderstood a lot of what I was trying to say.

 

Shooting a gun kills people. Newbies shoot a gun. Thus, shooting a gun must be a "newbie move," right??

 

No. No, that just makes you a more verstile player.

 

Sorry.. it's just that all this newbie talk makes me laugh/makes me angry at the same time.

[ArtifeX]

Originally posted by Vorax

 

Only true if the strong stance is using heal, otherwise they just can't strike fast enough. You must agree a medium stance user has a much better chance of hitting you 3 times then a strong stance does even once. 3 is all it takes. With the right hits, it only take 2 time with medium. If someone is using heal however, I will agree, that you have to use strong against them, just because they just keep healing and the game goes forever. But, not always. If the medium stance guy is using drain, he will take the strong stance guy as if he didn't have the heal and again, the fight is over in 2-3 hits, easily landed with the medium stance.

 

Use of force powers is a whole different discussion; one that I'll get to soon.

 

Most people use level 3 saber defense. It does not stop anyone from connecting with light or medium once they swing.

 

It actually does. Maybe one out of every twenty Light Style swings will connect on a player with level 3 saber defense, is either standing still or moving, and is facing his attacker.

 

Unless the guy can swing really fast...umm...wait your right. Light and medium are better then strong. Try fighting someone that is moving. Your point might be true for attacking someone who is away from their computer or getting a connection loss, but other then that, people move in the game. If they are using strong, they are that much easier to hit.

 

Yes, you are more vulnerable to attack while in Strong stance, but not much; especially against Light and Medium styles. With Medium, you have to try to hit them from an odd angle--attacking them directly will get blocked automaticlly a large percentage of the time. Light style requires an even greater angle because of its abbreviated range.

 

Hiding in the corner is hardly a show stopper for light or medium. So many people try this with me...once Several ways around it. With medium: Just jump, from slightly farther back then normal and slash down. Wack. With light stance, do a roll towards them, then slash. Both can easily stop the hide in the corner and crouch guys. If you have pull, you can also drag them out of there. With push, taunt with your saber a bit, till they try to swing that big clunky strong stance...or any stance, then just push them over and kill them.

 

- Vorax

 

1. By forcing you to jump, I have put you into your weakest possible defensive situation, while I am standing still and crouched--my strongest defensive situation. I can take advantage of this in many ways, not the least of which is use of push and pull.

 

2. Rolls require a short recovery time upon completion. At that time you are 100% vulnerable to any saber attack I would choose to make (yes, even light style attacks would work then). You'll never get the chance to land that slash you're speaking of.

 

3. It is completely impossible to push or pull someone who has level 3 push and pull themselves and is standing still. You will simply use up your force pool and they will remain motionless.

 

4. By, "taunt with your saber" I suppose you mean make a few feints to draw an attack? That might work, but it relies on them coming out of the corner of their own volition. If they're stubborn about staying where they're at, this could be ineffective.

[Picasso]

 

 

Again, more reasons to use strong rather than medium if your goal is to win and not role play.

 

 

 

Is it just me or is this game about roleplaying rather then just slash?

[ArtifeX]

I posted this to another forum, but I think it explains my point eloquently enough to warrant a double-post:

 

...I admit it takes more skill to use Light than Medium and more to use Medium than Strong. That is only because Light and Medium are intrinsically weaker styles. You have to be much, much better to be successful in their use. The same player would end up better off practicing with the strong style, however.

 

You can compare it to the Bryar pistol. It takes a lot of skill to take someone down with the Bryar pistol; much more than it does to kill with the Rocket Launcher. But does that mean that you want to spend all of your time learning to use the Bryar pistol? Wouldn't that time be better spent becoming more proficient with the rocket launcher? That is, if your goal is keep the high score.

[Soul-Burn]

Heh...

Killing people with weaker weapons is usually harder but much more fulfilling..

 

Their whines about how they happen to lag just now or "you newbie light stance user!" is such a delight to hear when you know you're just better :-P

[ArtifeX]

Originally posted by Soul-Burn

Heh...

Killing people with weaker weapons is usually harder but much more fulfilling..

 

Their whines about how they happen to lag just now or "you newbie light stance user!" is such a delight to hear when you know you're just better :-P

 

I'm sure everyone recognizes your great skill when the map is over and you have 2 kills and the winner has 20.

[Soul-Burn]

I'm sure everyone recognizes your great skill when the map is over and you have 2 kills and the winner has 20.

 

LOL!!!!!!!

 

I don't have to prove my skill to anyone. I play for fun, and this is what I consider fun.

 

Btw, even when I play like this, I turn up in the top 3 out of 16... (not to whine, but did I mention that atleast half of the people there have 60 ping while I'm stuck with 180?)

 

 

Of all people, I thought u'd be the one to agree with me on this.... Well, you show again that you care for score and not for playing for fun.

[kritschewsky]

Okay, we have two groups of people here.

One defending strong stance and one defending medium and somewhat the fast style.

 

I'll make it easy. The toughest duels are when no force powers are allowed. In such duels medium and fast stances are the best.

Red stance IS good there as well, if executed good. But if only used, you WILL loose. There is no point to argue about that.

With medium style you will kill in 2-3 hits.

With red stance in a duel no force power, you need 2 hits to kill, 1 with DFA of course, but that one you will be lucky to get in if you meet experienced players.

 

However, on a server where force powers are allowed, the red stance gets a new meening, you will have to use it more often as your opponent otherwise will heal themself. Unless as stated above, you use drain. The medium stance is also here very good, but it is advisable to try to use the red stance at some point.

 

Someone said the red stance is better as it reaches longer.

But, that is why players are moving around. Experienced players knows how far you reach with strong stance, and will there fore not be within that reach, but will be close enough to do a quick counter towards your just now missed swing.

 

To say that the red stance is useless though is very very wrong.

The forward slash needs abet more targeting to get in, but is fairly fast for a red stance, and should be used often, as it is a good swing. Use red stance to keep wild chasers at bay, then switch to yellow for some action.

 

We all play differently. But, all I can say is that all really good players out there, use medium stance more. Yes it is harder to use, but when you know how, you will be more lethal than an equally experienced player using red stance. I have seen it very often and done it very often. The key is to move around. Some might look at you and think WTF are you doing?? Just volting and rolling around. But it is not without thought. You can perform attacks from medium and blue stance during the most awkward acrobatic tricks.

One thing you mentioned that is good, is that you can change direction in a mid roll. That can perform some real confusion for your opponent and open him up for attacks if used timingly and correct.

All stances are good and usefull depending on the situation.

If you however meet a very good player, you are wise to not use red stance too much, but stick to mostly medium.

And to players only using medium, you ought to learn the red stance aswell, as you WILL have use of it. Even if you only will do 1 or 2 swings during a fight with strong stance, if you have mostly used fast and medium, your opponent won't expect you using it, and will fall for it most of the time.

Do not over use the strong stance, but use it sparingly, timingly and with thought.

 

Last note, the medium stance 360 arc swing will do damage equal to red stance, is easy to execute and makes you to do that "strongstance" swing in medium style. The reach is not as good, but the damage is, and that attack comes after a normal medium swing which meens it is part of a 2,3 or 4 combo using medium style.

Backattacks are not useless. Flip over yout opponent and immediatly perfom a back attack. It might not hit, but then again it might, performing very high damage, probably resulting in a kill.

[[del] Twitch]

I'm a big fan of a big bucket of diversity, myself. You know, rolling/walljumping/wallrunning/light/medium/heavy/kicking/

vertical strikes/horizontal strikes/comboes/one hit kills.........

 

And taunting. And kicking people off ledges.

 

Like it matters what stance you use: you shouldn't use it all the time. Mixing it up fakes people out....having done this multiple times, I've been able to *kick people off ledges* to their death because they just sat there wondering what I was doing...

 

 

- Twitch

[tam]

whenever u use heavy stance, ur leaving urself open to rolls, when u use medium stance, ur leaving ur self open to light slashes, when ur using light, u got good defnece, but no offence

[Vorax]

Originally posted by kritschewsky

Okay, we have two groups of people here.

One defending strong stance and one defending medium and somewhat the fast style.

 

I'll make it easy. The toughest duels are when no force powers are allowed. In such duels medium and fast stances are the best.

Red stance IS good there as well, if executed good. But if only used, you WILL loose. There is no point to argue about that.

With medium style you will kill in 2-3 hits.

With red stance in a duel no force power, you need 2 hits to kill, 1 with DFA of course, but that one you will be lucky to get in if you meet experienced players.

 

However, on a server where force powers are allowed, the red stance gets a new meening, you will have to use it more often as your opponent otherwise will heal themself. Unless as stated above, you use drain. The medium stance is also here very good, but it is advisable to try to use the red stance at some point.

 

Someone said the red stance is better as it reaches longer.

But, that is why players are moving around. Experienced players knows how far you reach with strong stance, and will there fore not be within that reach, but will be close enough to do a quick counter towards your just now missed swing.

 

To say that the red stance is useless though is very very wrong.

The forward slash needs abet more targeting to get in, but is fairly fast for a red stance, and should be used often, as it is a good swing. Use red stance to keep wild chasers at bay, then switch to yellow for some action.

 

We all play differently. But, all I can say is that all really good players out there, use medium stance more. Yes it is harder to use, but when you know how, you will be more lethal than an equally experienced player using red stance. I have seen it very often and done it very often. The key is to move around. Some might look at you and think WTF are you doing?? Just volting and rolling around. But it is not without thought. You can perform attacks from medium and blue stance during the most awkward acrobatic tricks.

One thing you mentioned that is good, is that you can change direction in a mid roll. That can perform some real confusion for your opponent and open him up for attacks if used timingly and correct.

All stances are good and usefull depending on the situation.

If you however meet a very good player, you are wise to not use red stance too much, but stick to mostly medium.

And to players only using medium, you ought to learn the red stance aswell, as you WILL have use of it. Even if you only will do 1 or 2 swings during a fight with strong stance, if you have mostly used fast and medium, your opponent won't expect you using it, and will fall for it most of the time.

Do not over use the strong stance, but use it sparingly, timingly and with thought.

 

Last note, the medium stance 360 arc swing will do damage equal to red stance, is easy to execute and makes you to do that "strongstance" swing in medium style. The reach is not as good, but the damage is, and that attack comes after a normal medium swing which meens it is part of a 2,3 or 4 combo using medium style.

Backattacks are not useless. Flip over yout opponent and immediatly perfom a back attack. It might not hit, but then again it might, performing very high damage, probably resulting in a kill.

 

Very good points. I totally agree. Red has a place when force healing is going on, but in general, medium will rule

 

- Vorax

[Soul-Burn]

Hey kritschewsky!! I remember dueling you

 

Originally posted by tam

whenever u use heavy stance, ur leaving urself open to rolls

 

Rolls do no damage... and by the time u'r out of the roll, he's out of the swing.

[fgStratus]

It seems a lot of you feel very indignant when Artifex associates "skill" with "score". This seems like the syndrome in many schools where people whine "I'm smart, I just don't try. (AKA I'm not functioning intelligently."

 

It doesn't matter how "skilled" you are, it matters how well you play- which is determined by your score. If you are the best player out there but you frequently score below first, then you are not FUNCTIONING as the best player. The only way to quantifiably judge skill (read: how good you are at a game) then, is to compare scores between players in a game.

 

 

On another note, contrary to what many of you have said, I don't believe Offensive Stance is the best in Force-Enabled games. Since so many of you profess to be so good at this game, I'm sure you already know the "strafe diagonally towards a guy while he's swinging and force pull him, knocking him onto the ground (past you thus not sabering you) and giving you an opening to slice him" trick. This trick is most easily performed on the red stance due to its long wind-up time.

 

However, Offensive Stance does seem to be the most powerful in hectic FFA games. Its almots 1-hit kill with any swing since everyone has taken a little damage, and its wide swings and long range lets you frequently kill multiple people with each swing in a crowd.

 

In an FFA duel situation, OS (Offensive Stance) is also less effective (more of a quick-switch stance) because saber throw is still allowed (why do people put 18 points into that anyays?) Hence your long swings leave a large opening for the guy to just back up and throw his saber at you.

 

I believe strong stance to be dominant in 1v1 no force duels for a few reasons.

-You can dodge just as easily no matter which stance you are using, you can jump/roll mid-swing with either stance. In fact, with OS, you can even turn your swing into an offensive lunge. (To do this medium stance would require that you be near the other player and that he isn't doing an overhead swing at you.)

 

-No flipkicks. You can't flipkick in force disabled servers, which removes one of the larger weaknesses of the OS.

 

-The OS diagonal swings (move diagonally + attack) go off (and are recovered from) as quickly as the medium swings, but they do 100 damage and are more difficult to block.

 

Many of the medium stance advocates seem to draw a picture where you constantly roll/jump/weave around while taking quick swipes at the cumbersome OS charger. This will not happen vs an equally skilled opponent. The ONLY differences between the OS user and you are that:

-He (the OS user) doesn't have to swing twice in a direction to get the 360 degree flank swing.

-His swings have longer range

-His swings do more damage

-His swings are more likely to pass through your defenses

-Some of his swings are slower

 

But it should be impossible to hit a good player (that is also dodging) by using medium stance due to its low penetration and short range.

[Chewie Bakker]

Artifex has done a good job compiling all of this information on saber dueling. It's a pity that it's so biased against light stance and favors strongs stance.

 

 

The language used is a little one-sided. I'm not saying that red stance is for n00bs, but blue-stance isn't just for n00bs either. If the manual wasn't so one-sided it would be a great addition to the Jedi Outcast texts. Now, it's not more than an opinion with a lot of information.

 

 

Great job, but cut out the biased-ness and it would be über-1337!

 

P.S. What's a Drizzt? I think I ran into one when playing Baldur's Gate.