Parry on all melee weapons

[icemount]

Dear Obsidian, 

I have a suggestion on how to make the combat a bit more flexible. 

While playing Avowed I found that as much as ther is exciting freedom in combining your weapons and magic, there is no possibility to parry with any dual weapon scenario (only sowrd and board and two handers). 

Please consider adding a seperate parry button/action, so that every melee weapon, regardless of secondary is able to parry. You have character abilities dedicated to this function, it is just such a shame it is so restrictive at the moment.

I am imagining a dagger+sword rogue or sword+pistol pirate and it would be great if such setups would allow for parry and not only dodge as defensive non-magical option.

On other note, I really enjoy your game so far, thanks and keep up the good work !!

[SenSx]

I believe this there is a balance reason for that as well, dps and versality in exchange of no parry.

But I agree I will probably miss the parry a lot when playing a dual wield character, maybe they can just make it weaker ?

Also I was told parry was also possible with 1h only ? (nothing in off hand)

Edited Sunday at 07:48 PM by SenSx

[icemount]

To be fair it can be balanced in a lot of different ways, like parry efficiency (stamina usage) and/or partial damage mitigation, so that chip dmg goes through.

As for using one handers only, that is indeed an option, but considering it is "just" a weaker two-hander, I do nto see the benefits, besides as I wrote earlier it was more for a rogue character.

In the end if someone really, really likes a certain weapon they will with it, but I believe it is fairly restrictive, the way it is now.

I would prefer to have a choice between using dodges and parries, instead being forced into one playstyle, but maybe that is just me

 

[SenSx]

I don't think it's just you.

Parries are fun, and I don't like that to be taken out.

I still enjoy builds and personalizations, so I still would not want duel wield to have all the advantages, I'm sure it can be balanced differently.

Adding a new key for that seems possible, I remember I installed a similar mod in Skyrim for either block or bash with dual wield.

Also there is still sense to use 1H instead of 2H since it's faster, and a middle ground between 2H and Dual wield (faster and parry).

Maybe 1H can be improved as well to make it more appealing.

Edited Monday at 01:02 PM by SenSx

[omgFIREBALLS]

On 2/23/2025 at 8:47 PM, SenSx said:

I believe this there is a balance reason for that as well, dps and versality in exchange of no parry.

I'm chalking this (and a number of other issues) down to not having enough buttons on the gamepad, so parry cannot be a separate bind even for people with a keyboard and dozens of spare binds.

Yeah, it bothers me too. Though parrying doesn't feel that great to me in Avowed.

[thelee]

On 2/23/2025 at 12:16 PM, icemount said:

As for using one handers only, that is indeed an option, but considering it is "just" a weaker two-hander,

is there really no benefit for a one-handed style play? i would find it a little odd that you would be able to block and parry without a shield and just have an open offhand, but then there's no downside to just having a shield anyway.

[DropkickGoose]

This really feels almost like either a control issue, in which case use a lot of FromSofts controller set up combined with the radial, or something that got cut for time. Being a swashbuckler with a sword and pistol, both being straight in the ranger tree, and not being able to parry is just... Not very swashbuckle-y? It makes me not want to try and play that class. As other people have said, parrying with a one handed weapon means either having no offhand, in which case just use a two hander that'll deal more damage and stun, or a shield.

Most frustrating for me is not being able to parry as a spell blade. There's neat combos of frost sword/frost grimoire and fire sword/fire grimoire that I would love to play, and each of those swords have a parry upgrade that I want to use to spread more of the condition around. But I just can't... So I wind up back on wand/grimoire and feeling limited or unfulfilled. One of my biggest gripes with the game (which says something about the rest of the game being pretty dang good).

[ImmaDadTho]

I would definitely love some kind of mechanism or ability while dual wielding weapons that resembles some kind of ability to block/ redirect the enemy. Maybe the ability to outright parry  and stun an enemy will be out of the question for dual wielding but it can be replaced by a redirection of some sort where you character redirects the attack either back at the attacker for range attacks(spears, maybe even arrows who knows, kinda like the arcane veil), or just simply destroys/deflects the projectile being sent your way; or redirects an attack to another enemy for enemy’s attacking with a melee weapon, or simply just evades the attack and sets up behind the attacker leaving them open for a nice counter attack that boosts your critical chance by x amount. This is assuming running dual wield the player will most likely be running with there dexterity/perception pretty high makes sense to give that play style a lot more movement and options that have to do with movement and flexibility. It can work even dual wielding pistols/wands(don’t know about the two wands, maybe Wand and Grimoire is more likely), you can shoot whatever projectile is thrown at you when you unlock the ability for it, and with melee attacks the character just evades and positions themselves behind the enemy to get a clean shot, or decreases cast time for a second. Just some ideas. Love the game so far. Running two daggers so this would be cool to do while I’m playing. I don’t even know if these things are plausible but they sound cool to me and it’s what I am envisioning my dual dagger assassin being able to accomplish in a fight lol 

[Frak_the_2nd]

On 2/24/2025 at 9:43 PM, thelee said:

is there really no benefit for a one-handed style play? i would find it a little odd that you would be able to block and parry without a shield and just have an open offhand, but then there's no downside to just having a shield anyway.

This is what annoys me the most. I tested a bit of dual wield / empty single wield as a melee ranger.

- Benefit of dual wield: you can spam faster attacks by alternating between both buttons. Works with crit builds.

- Disadvantage of dual wield. No parry, and attack combo easier loses benefits. So you rely on dodge and Shadowing Beyond.

For single wield there is no benefit if using an empty offhand. They dropped the ball on this part. You might as well use a shield.

IIRC Deadfire and POE1 gave you higher crit change if off-hand was empty.

 

Edited Thursday at 09:42 AM by Frak_the_2nd
Added a sentence