Why is parrying so artificially bad on thrusting swords and the likings?

[Comrade Johnny]

I honestly dont get it. I constantly try to run two cleanrot knight swords (because just looks cool I guess) and my main one has parry on it. Hitting parries is an absolute pain with this. Eventually got mad, slapped carian retaliation on a buckler and suddenly I parry everything. I literally just switched the weapons, is there any reason parry has to be so bad on normal swords?

[LuckyCheshire]

It just is. The reasoning I guess is to artificially create a reason for players to ever use small shields besides for passive stat boosts.

[Artek [General]]

To keep Parrying shields relevant, otherwise there would be no reason to use them when you can have an off hand offensive weapon.
You trade inferior Parrying for offensive capability. Although I think it's fair to say that they overdone it.

BTW: by putting Carian Retaliation on buckler you actually made it worse - Buckler has a unique natural parry that has the longest parry window of them all.
You can put CarRet on a medium shield and have same parry window as a small shield. You just pay FP for it.

[Comrade Johnny]

Originally posted by Artek General:

To keep Parrying shields relevant, otherwise there would be no reason to use them when you can have an off hand offensive weapon.
You trade inferior Parrying for offensive capability. Although I think it's fair to say that they overdone it.

BTW: by putting Carian Retaliation on buckler you actually made it worse - Buckler has a unique natural parry that has the longest parry window of them all.
You can put CarRet on a medium shield and have same parry window as a small shield. You just pay FP for it.

Really? I read the wiki and it basically said that buckler had just a slightly shorter recovery window. Good to know, I underestimated the buckler parry then

[Valdeberg]

Carian Retaliation doesn't spend FP on parrying a physical attack. Trust me, whenever I go say hi to PCR I have no blue flask and no need for them! It's Golden parry that spends FP every time.

To answer the thread's question, I guess it can be because of lore. This game justifies a lot of its balancing by lore reasons, like how Holy is basically useless against divinities. So, in reality, is it easier to parry a sword with another sword, or with a shield?

With that said, it genuinely does lead to a rather weird game balancing where small shields' utility feels a bit artificial.

[Artek [General]]

Originally posted by Valdeberg:

To answer the thread's question, I guess it can be because of lore. This game justifies a lot of its balancing by lore reasons, like how Holy is basically useless against divinities. So, in reality, is it easier to parry a sword with another sword, or with a shield?

With that said, it genuinely does lead to a rather weird game balancing where small shields' utility feels a bit artificial.

I mean: why would you ever bother with the likes of Buckler if you could have a Cold Rapier or Cold Dagger that could do the same? It makes sense in spirit - they just overdone it. A couple of extra frames would not make them OP or anything.

As for lore / IRL rules - weapons are almost just as good for parrying. That's what all the protruding bits are for - parrying and catching opponent's blades.
The proper hand-guards, like the ones found on Rapier or Great Epe are basically half-way through to becoming a Buckler themselves. Don't even start me on lore-accurate Zweihander we have in this game.
I'm honestly amazed that out of many features that came back from Dark Souls 2 - the great weapon parrying wasn't one of them. It was kinda worthless, but hilarious.

[Comrade Johnny]

Originally posted by Valdeberg:

Carian Retaliation doesn't spend FP on parrying a physical attack. Trust me, whenever I go say hi to PCR I have no blue flask and no need for them! It's Golden parry that spends FP every time.

To answer the thread's question, I guess it can be because of lore. This game justifies a lot of its balancing by lore reasons, like how Holy is basically useless against divinities. So, in reality, is it easier to parry a sword with another sword, or with a shield?

With that said, it genuinely does lead to a rather weird game balancing where small shields' utility feels a bit artificial.

Tbh, I am not exactly the expert in historical fighting since I only do sport fencing but there parrying with the weapon? Looks easy, kinda is. Bit of a timing and position question but its definately capable. Against light weapons it would absolutely work. Against heavier weapons, dunno, doubt it but something like a cleanrot knight sword (aka a fixed blade, sport weapons have a bit of a bendy blade because we dont want to kill our opponent) should be able to deflect pretty much anything thats its own size or a bit taller. No idea whether a dedicated parrying shield would fare much better, it should because they were used irl aswell. But if we go to the realistic path then I am sorry but I have to say that the entire parry window is complete humbug because if you hold your weapon in front of you without moving (aka the parry start and only active window) you will get hit 100% of times, the swiping motion would be the actual parry but I guess that would make it too easy because it would have a big window (and theoretically should have but I get it, this game is to suffer)
But from a balancing standpoint it makes sense. So I guess its just balancing and I get why because dual cleanrot knight swords are already DPS machines, even without infusions and having that for parrying would be pretty stupid. But at the same time, parrying is also pretty stupid as it is (because if done right you can just troll absolutely everything unless netcode tells you not to). I guess Ill just get better because parrying with a sword feels much more badass than with a sword. Plus nobody expects you to do that XD

[Senki]

it's honestly sad that fromsoft created some of the best feeling parry gameplay with Sekiro and when Elden Ring came out it's just the trash dark souls parry again

they really had an issue with breaking their dark souls shackles with this IP, gameplay could've been much better if they didn't make Dark Souls 3 2.0

[Artek [General]]

Originally posted by Senki:

it's honestly sad that fromsoft created some of the best feeling parry gameplay with Sekiro and when Elden Ring came out it's just the trash dark souls parry again

they really had an issue with breaking their dark souls shackles with this IP, gameplay could've been much better if they didn't make Dark Souls 3 2.0

They kinda did though - in the form of Guard Counters. Its not the same, by a long shot, but its as close as it can be.
I do miss Mikiri Counter though. Genuinely.

[peep]

I don't understand how they made Sekiro with fantastic parrying and then later Elden Ring which has awful parrying.

[Senki]

Originally posted by Artek General:

Originally posted by Senki:

it's honestly sad that fromsoft created some of the best feeling parry gameplay with Sekiro and when Elden Ring came out it's just the trash dark souls parry again

they really had an issue with breaking their dark souls shackles with this IP, gameplay could've been much better if they didn't make Dark Souls 3 2.0

They kinda did though - in the form of Guard Counters. Its not the same, by a long shot, but its as close as it can be.
I do miss Mikiri Counter though. Genuinely.

guard counters are fun but the actual parrying still feels bad and they could've done a lot more with the gameplay in this new IP instead of just dark souls with very minor additions

They basically did add the sekiro parry in the dlc with one of the flask tears and it only made me sadder that it's not a core mechanic

Something like Mikiri counter could've also been amazing in boss fights. Another souls type game just released(Khazan) and it has something similar, feels so good when you pull it off

[Artek [General]]

Originally posted by Senki:

Originally posted by Artek General:

They kinda did though - in the form of Guard Counters. Its not the same, by a long shot, but its as close as it can be.
I do miss Mikiri Counter though. Genuinely.

guard counters are fun but the actual parrying still feels bad and they could've done a lot more with the gameplay in this new IP instead of just dark souls with very minor additions

They basically did add the sekiro parry in the dlc with one of the flask tears and it only made me sadder that it's not a core mechanic

Something like Mikiri counter could've also been amazing in boss fights. Another souls type game just released(Khazan) and it has something similar, feels so good when you pull it off

The Parrying has been probably kept in old condition for the sake of PvP. Parrying used to be instant, but became delayed thanks to dark souls 2 which realized that it was too OP and that's how mechanic remained since.
Sekiro deflecting didn't made a comeback precisely for that reason - it would make pvp unplayable.
...
Except it already is, no Parrying needed. Whoops.

[Senki]

Originally posted by Artek General:

Originally posted by Senki:

guard counters are fun but the actual parrying still feels bad and they could've done a lot more with the gameplay in this new IP instead of just dark souls with very minor additions

They basically did add the sekiro parry in the dlc with one of the flask tears and it only made me sadder that it's not a core mechanic

Something like Mikiri counter could've also been amazing in boss fights. Another souls type game just released(Khazan) and it has something similar, feels so good when you pull it off

The Parrying has been probably kept in old condition for the sake of PvP. Parrying used to be instant, but became delayed thanks to dark souls 2 which realized that it was too OP and that's how mechanic remained since.
Sekiro deflecting didn't made a comeback precisely for that reason - it would make pvp unplayable.
...
Except it already is, no Parrying needed. Whoops.

There's a game called Wo Long that has both pvp and the sekiro parry

don't know how good it is though because I never tried pvp in it but I can't imagine it being much worse than fromsoftware's pvp lmao