Blocking, Perfect Block, Ripostes, and MASTER STRIKES explained!

[FwuffyBear]

The first thing that I would like to clarify is that defense, unlike offense, does NOT take weapon-direction of your star-reticle into account. It doesn't matter what your weapon-polarity (the red highlighted direction indicated by your star-reticle) is toggled. Essentially, there is only one defensive orientation, and it covers attacks from one singular opponent (in front of you), no matter what direction they swing.

For the purposes of this discussion, the opponent's swing will be broken down into 3 phases:

• Phase 1:
  The opponent will draw back his weapon (watch for shoulder movement) and then begin to swing the weapon at the target (player). This phase happens BEFORE the "green-shield" icon appears.
  
  
• Phase 2:
  The opponent's weapon will have already begun to swing at the target (player), and follow through until just before the moment of contact with the target (player). This phase is easily indicated by the "green-shield" icon that shows up the center of your star-reticle for the duration of this phase.
  
  
• Phase 3:
  The opponent's weapon finally makes contact with the player, and it lasts all the way throughout the rest of the animation, followed by the back-swing.

Note: Please do not ask me how many active frames are in each phase, because I simply do not know, and I have no desire to spend my time finding out.

• Blocking
  If you hold the block button down during any of these "Phases," you will simply block the opponent's swing. Please note that blocking a hit drains a good amount of stamina. Oddly enough, once you start oufitting yourself with the higher defensive plate armor, you'll take less stamina drain from just taking the hit rather than trying to block it (go figure)
  
  
• Perfect Block
  If you wait until "Phase 2" of the opponent's attack (indicated by the "green shield" icon) to press the block button, the game will enter a bullet-time-like slowdown and you will essentially parry the opponent's weapon off to the side. When this happens, priority is given to you to follow up with an attack (Riposte) which the opponent can only avoid by either doing their own perfect-block or master-strike.
  
  
• Master Strike
  This is what everyone's been waiting for. If you press block during "Phase 1" or in the early frames of "Phase 2" of the opponent's attack, you will not only parry the attack, but you will automatically (without pressing any additional buttons or inputs) follow-up with an extremely quick and unavoidable riposte that will be indicated by several different animations.
  
  The player will either strike the opponent repeatedly in the head with the pommel of the sword, back the opponent up with several pokes to the chest, kick the opponent in the stomach, interrupt the opponent's swing with a downward slice at the head, glide into a slice at the right/left torso, or follow-up with diagonally upward slices at the opponent's thigh/lower-abdomen area. The animation is loosely based on the direction of the opponent's swing.
  
  Despite what you've been hearing, master-strikes are NOT RANDOM. As a general rule, you have to press the block button BEFORE the "green-shield" icon shows up. My advice is to watch the opponent's shoulders for movement; that's the give-away. Though, that may just be an indication of the opponent changing stances. If you practice, you'll be able to spot the difference and even if you're slightly late, it'll still register the master-strike if you press block during the early frames of the "green-shield."

Last, but not least, I want to quickly touch on one last subject, which is combos. Anyone who's played this game for over an hour will realize that opponents just don't let you combo them. There's two ways to land a combo. The first is after a perfect-block; I've had about a 20% chance success rate with this. The second method, is to walk/run up into an opponent to initiate a clinch, mash the special attack button (by default, it's 'F' on the PC), and when you overpower/push the opponent off, the AI will NOT block your next attack for whatever reason. This is the best time to execute your combo, I've had about an 80% success rate with this method. For best results, try pushing the opponent against a wall, so that they can't back out of your attacks.

Happy Hunting!

[Digital Aura]

SO...the block at the green shield automatically creates a master strike?

[Damedius]

If defense doesn't take weapon direction into account, then why does the weapon tutorial say it does when you are training with Captain Bernard.

[Auraln aka Psycho]

Originally posted by Digital Aura:

SO...the block at the green shield automatically creates a master strike?

Umm they said. "you have to be prepared to press the block button BEFORE the "green-shield" icon shows up" BEFORE key word there. Idk if this is true or not as of this moment.

[Kithsakhai]

the issue most have with the master strike, is when the NPC does it to YOU... no way to know/avoid/pre-empt it other than saying screw that and shooting them in the head with an arrow... or having a warfare skill of 16

[BonesAndFaces]

Master strike is tricky to do, and very frustrating to receive since you cant do anything about it.

[BonesAndFaces]

Also, whats the point of side-stepping then?

[FwuffyBear]

Yes, as a general rule, you have to press block BEFORE the "green-shield" icon shows up (it will also register if you press block in the VERY EARLY frames of the "green-shield" icon). Contrary to what most think, the "green-shield" doesn't show up at the very beginning of the attack animation cycle; It shows up about 15% into the attack animation. YES, there is a window of frames that occur between the start of the opponent's attack and appearance of the "green-shield" icon. That's when you're supposed to hit the block button to initiate the master strike.

The opponent's shoulder movement is what you should watch.

[clayffo]

Originally posted by Kithsakhai:

the issue most have with the master strike, is when the NPC does it to YOU... no way to know/avoid/pre-empt it other than saying screw that and shooting them in the head with an arrow... or having a warfare skill of 16

kiting them with arrows to the face is definitely the way to play early on. all this other stuff is too hard to do until you level up quite a bit

[FwuffyBear]

Originally posted by Damedius:

If defense doesn't take weapon direction into account, then why does the weapon tutorial say it does when you are training with Captain Bernard.

They were probably aiming to implement this into the game, but they decided to go with the more simplified version for whatever reason.

[FwuffyBear]

Originally posted by BonesAndFaces:

Also, whats the point of side-stepping then?

Opponents can't block attacks from the side. Only the front.

[lefty1117]

Do you PRESS block and let it go or do you press block and hold it through the attacker's animation?

[FwuffyBear]

Originally posted by lefty1117:

Do you PRESS block and let it go or do you press block and hold it through the attacker's animation?

You can press and let go. Holding is usually a bad idea; it disables perfect-block for a certain window of frames when you do "regular blocking."

[Musekater]

Thanks for the lesson!

This should be sticky!

[paoweeotter]

Originally posted by Digital Aura:

SO...the block at the green shield automatically creates a master strike?

No. Block when Green shield will make you do a perfect block. Meaning block that doesn't cost you stamina.

Master Strike is block the moment you see them attack. This happens before green shield pops up. If you only block when you see the green shield you'll never do a master strike.

Perfect block is nice if you want to play ping pong with the enemy (damn u bernard). Perfect block also lets you strike to start a combo but remember they can perfect block or master strike you as well when u do

[Ghigi]

Obligatory rant: morph this into a Guide ! Great explanaion. Will surely dig for master strikes.