Bug/exploit: Ranged attacks with melee weapons

[pentheraphobia]

Discovered this today, purely by accident. A loading screen tip told me that I could queue actions by holding shift, and i went to test that. A common combat sequence of mine was to shoot my crossbow then swap to melee weapons.

 

To reproduce:

-Be a rogue. I haven't tested with other classes.

-Be out of combat.

-Have a ranged weapon equpped in hand (I used an arbalest), and a melee weapon set ready (i had a flail/hatchet).

-While the game is paused, order rogue to use crippling or blinding strike on an enemy in range.

-Without unpausing, hold shift and click a melee weapon set. (holding shift may or may not be required, I only tested it while holding shift)

-Unpause

 

Your character will swap and use the melee weapons for the crippling/blinding strike, without moving into melee range. Future attacks go back to requiring melee range, so I believe the issue is in the ability's code. It registers a valid target for the ranged version of the ability, but doesn't notice that weapons were swapped.

[KKDragonLord]

Maybe that explains when the Bandit leader in Black Meadow managed to take down my wizard with a special melee attack from half a screen away