Anyone care to explain the combat?

[Moses]

I read the game was hard, and that's always a red flag these days because that usually always means arbitrary difficulty and that seems to be exactly what this game is. In Dark Souls, for example, it's hard in the sense that if you time an attack wrong, you'll probably die. That's not arbitrary difficulty, that's just hard and that's how it should be. Dodge, block, or parry and time your attacks properly and you can win most fights. In this game that doesn't seem to be the case. Parrying doesn't seem to do literally anything, numerous times now I've dodged, watched the enemies attack hit the ground, and the damage was applied to me.

But that's not the worst part. The worst part is timing your attacks is irrelevant because they do no damage. You, literally, can't even see the health bar move down the slightest bit. It's dozens of attacks landed on your part vs being able to only handle 1-3 taken to die.

Is this how the entire game is? I'm only a few hours in, but if this kind of scaling persists until the end I'm just going to move on. I like difficult, but arbitrary difficulty isn't difficult, it's a gimmick and it's lazy.

So, does this ever improve or is this just the game?

[Moses]

I've been reading through some older threads on Steam and other forums and the consensus seems to be "avoid all combat and just wait until you can get a companion to do all of the fighting for you"......I've read this dozens of times.

It seems very much like they didn't want you to fight anything, a truly bizarre decision but I can't look at it from any other perspective. I guess I'll just be running from fights from now on, pretty much defeats the purpose of the entire game but they don't give you any other option.

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

Originally posted by Moses:

Is this how the entire game is?

No.

Originally posted by Moses:

I'm only a few hours in,

Hours are meaningless. How far have you come in terms of player stats or story chapter? Eventually, even the character level doesn't mean much in ELEX anymore due to permanent bonus options.

Originally posted by Moses:

I've been reading through some older threads on Steam and other forums and the consensus seems to be "avoid all combat and just wait until you can get a companion to do all of the fighting for you"......I've read this dozens of times.

Puzzling!

Wherever you may have read that, those guys are mistaken.

In a nutshell, you take up with foes you can handle. Whether you can handle them depends on combat skills, weapon and armor, strategies and tactics and your personal skills. Early on, all the lesser creatures (and some humans) are low-hanging fruit. After investing a bit into combat skills and/or equipment, you can take up with more dangerous enemies. Gradually.

If you're masochistic and enjoy long battles, you may do it like this guy:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p79SNH8BzrU

There are also various ways how to cheese through fights, such as with clerics' PSI powers like Black Hole. Afterall, the clerics can be joined at level 1 already - as the earliest of all factions.

And since experience points for kills are rather low, obviously you are well-recommended to focus on mission rewards. Early on especially all the errand boy tasks and easy non-combat missions. Thus, it can be beneficial to stay out of trouble while exploring the world, making a fortune, looking for allies and investing into (combat) skills. Eventually you become a warrior/hunter - soon enough - and you can take up with fearsome foes like trolls and kill them with a few hits only. If it takes more than a few hits to get killed, think twice, will it be worth the time and effort? If you're hunting for trophies, certainly. If you're killing high-level foes for XP, sure. But early on, hunting lesser beasts for just 5-10 XP each is a waste of time. Do it for some combat practice, but you gain many more XP for discovering the world and for completing easy missions.

About companions, yes, they can be helpful, but relying on them to do all fighting is ill-advised.

[Halcyform]

Simple observation should tell you that either your equipment is out of date or that you are in a higher level area you shouldn't be yet.

If you are in an area where you shouldn't be yet, expect combat to be a slog. You won't be strong enough to deal with it in a timely manner. Combat will be slow and death will be quick.

If you see something new (enemies or terrain), you should go in assuming you'll run into stronger enemies and approach it accordingly.

If you care more about following the story and want to tone down the combat aspect, you have a few options:

- Turn off combat stamina usage in settings
- Talk to every npc you run into. There's an early game vendor that sells an energy weapon you can use (regardless of faction) which will let you defeat most early game enemies quite easily. Energy weapon projectiles don't have an arc so you can engage enemies from very long range.
- Use elevation and npc pathing to your advantage.

Even when you get much stronger there are still some enemies that can overwhelm or surprise you if you get complacent.

As far as Dark Souls goes, those games are the equivalent of a hamster wheel, imo. The only fun aspect of those games is seeing how many ways you can cheese enemies to win almost instantly. The conventional combat in Dark Souls is boring as hell.

[regina_ragna]

An anvice around the sticky focus (sucks like hell in the beginning):
- sheathe your weapon - run past the enemy - draw again - attack
- never use the special attack
- learn some dexterity as well as strength

[Lil C]-[ew C]-[ew is ☂д☂]

Originally posted by Moses:

...and just wait until you can get a companion to do all of the fighting for you".......But that's not the worst part. The worst part is timing your attacks is irrelevant because they do no damage.

If you want to be capable to fight, break the game by cheating using that Elexir glitch or play grinding for hours by focusing to putt your attribute points on your dexterity and strength at first. ( My mistake at the beginning...I was adding to science to progress faster by reading books and completing missions )
Companions won't attack enemies at all unless they get hit back. ( I find this nonsense but I'm looking if I should use one modification on Nexus where you can make the ''A.I.'' of your allies to react first or once the enemy gets close to your character. But meh...I use them as bait and wait untill the enemy focus their attacks on them while I strike from other angles )
And so far I've been noticing most of humanoid companions mainly attack using melee even though they use ranged guns but only when the enemy gets in a higher or lower ground or when they ''walk by'' a stone rock or any propertie decal left in the world map and get stuck there.
Only C.R.O.N.Y. companion will use ranged attacks and seems to be the most helpfull since it drain enemy's health.

By the way when you think your attack are doing no damage is because you are attacking using low stamina. If you deplete at all your breath, striking using small amount of stamina will most of times do the lowest discret damage that seems like you are not hurting the enemy. ( Don't forget to turn off that magnetic annoying focus when enganging them in proximity. Specially when you are attempting to sneak behind them while they sleep. And if you do this, you got holster your weapon by far if you sneak unarmed and when you next to enemy and equip your stuff, the stupid focus will cancel your sneak approach and enemies will wake up )

I am only playing this because I have modded quite a bit Fallout 4 and made unstable the perfomance and diferent from that game. In Elex the exploration is limited as hell. Items won't appear back after days are past. And Elex run a bit more fine for my weak PC.....I mean if I wanted to review this game I certainly bomb but since I'm getting distracted. I won't.

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

You can toggle auto-aiming and target-locking helpers within the settings while playing. The settings are different, if you enter them from the game's main screen (so do it while playing).

Damage increase rules are simple. You can concatenate well-timed normal attacks as well as power-attacks (and a mix of both), if you pay attention to the power bar. Once it is full, you can use a special attack for maximum damage - and depending on weapon family.

[SIRCAM]

At first... yes, most of the time we need to run and avoid combat, even our companions can get eliminated, focus on increase your favorite skills over 65 and things will start feel different, C.R.O.N.Y. is a great addition.

If you manage to obtain an interesting weapon called The Redeemer, that could be a game changer. https://elex.fandom.com/wiki/The_Redeemer

[LunaFortuna]

I had no issues with combat. I ran and avoided everything at first. I only slowly and hesitantly started attempting combat once I got stronger. If something overpowered me, I ran away. Rinse and repeat. I eventually became strong enough to be able to take just about everything on, especially with a companion. But this didn't happen until mid-late game. For me, the combat wasn't the main point of this game. It's very realistic in the beginning. Your character starts out weak and detoxing from Elex, and everything overpowers him. Just run away from everything, enjoy the story, and you'll eventually be powerful enough to enjoy the combat.

[hammerofthegods]

Yeah, it's ♥♥♥♥

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

Originally posted by LunaFortuna:

I ran and avoided everything at first.

"Everything" including all the lesser creatures?

I mean, in the prologue you need to eliminate some mass rats, and past the prologue it can be good practice to get rid of any critter, mass rat, runt critter and other explicitly weakened creatures you encounter. All those giving 5-10 XP are low-hanging fruit. No need to waste time and effort on more dangerous beasts in long battles - if it requires more than a few hits, it may not be worth the effort - but soon enough one can take up with the next level creatures that give up to 25 XP. If investing into combat skills and equipment (such as by exploring freely and finding the many weapons and other equipment items one can get for free), one can handle more and more enemies.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1581209617

Else, yes, with avoidance one can go anywhere and e.g. join the clerics at level 1.

[Helgart]

it still like in Gothic you win combat by your status not by tricky moves. Also it probably makes no sense killing monsters on beginning because without a specific skill you won't get much trophies

[Shanks]

Originally posted by Moses:

I've been reading through some older threads on Steam and other forums and the consensus seems to be "avoid all combat and just wait until you can get a companion to do all of the fighting for you"......I've read this dozens of times.

It seems very much like they didn't want you to fight anything, a truly bizarre decision but I can't look at it from any other perspective. I guess I'll just be running from fights from now on, pretty much defeats the purpose of the entire game but they don't give you any other option.

nah thats ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥^^.
Just have 1 melee and ranged weapon. try to dodge often , get a companion as help, u need a few hours to figure out whats ur playstyle. i also played only ranged.

[Artur]

It's not hard, just extremely bad.
Attributes do nothing except enable you to wield better weapons.
Melee is basically just hitting left-click and hoping enemies don't stunlock you with their atrocious animations.
You're best off just going ranged, since enemy AI is too dumb to react from a distance.

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

Originally posted by Artur:

Attributes do nothing except enable you to wield better weapons.

Most skills are governed by a primary and a secondary attribute. Other skills are governed by one attribute.

Originally posted by Artur:

Melee is basically just hitting left-click and hoping enemies don't stunlock you with their atrocious animations.

Nope.

Close combat is about concatenating a sequence of well-timed hits (or power attacks) as to build up power for a final special attack. Each attack in the sequence increases damage. And obviously you would do that in accordance with an enemy's attack pattern and dodge away or fly away as to avoid taking a hit yourself.

[Ozric]

Originally posted by D'amarr from Darshiva:

Originally posted by Moses:

Is this how the entire game is?

No.

Originally posted by Moses:

I'm only a few hours in,

Hours are meaningless. How far have you come in terms of player stats or story chapter? Eventually, even the character level doesn't mean much in ELEX anymore due to permanent bonus options.

Originally posted by Moses:

I've been reading through some older threads on Steam and other forums and the consensus seems to be "avoid all combat and just wait until you can get a companion to do all of the fighting for you"......I've read this dozens of times.

Puzzling!

Wherever you may have read that, those guys are mistaken.

In a nutshell, you take up with foes you can handle. Whether you can handle them depends on combat skills, weapon and armor, strategies and tactics and your personal skills. Early on, all the lesser creatures (and some humans) are low-hanging fruit. After investing a bit into combat skills and/or equipment, you can take up with more dangerous enemies. Gradually.

If you're masochistic and enjoy long battles, you may do it like this guy:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p79SNH8BzrU

There are also various ways how to cheese through fights, such as with clerics' PSI powers like Black Hole. Afterall, the clerics can be joined at level 1 already - as the earliest of all factions.

And since experience points for kills are rather low, obviously you are well-recommended to focus on mission rewards. Early on especially all the errand boy tasks and easy non-combat missions. Thus, it can be beneficial to stay out of trouble while exploring the world, making a fortune, looking for allies and investing into (combat) skills. Eventually you become a warrior/hunter - soon enough - and you can take up with fearsome foes like trolls and kill them with a few hits only. If it takes more than a few hits to get killed, think twice, will it be worth the time and effort? If you're hunting for trophies, certainly. If you're killing high-level foes for XP, sure. But early on, hunting lesser beasts for just 5-10 XP each is a waste of time. Do it for some combat practice, but you gain many more XP for discovering the world and for completing easy missions.

About companions, yes, they can be helpful, but relying on them to do all fighting is ill-advised.

Your input here has helped me make a decision on this game. I'll be buying it. I have this to ask though. I'm strictly keyboard and mouse but I have never used WASD. I use directional arrows and the right side of the keyboard in general. DEL, END, R-CTRL, R-ALT etc. Is the game key re-map friendly? Thanks.