Will you be swapping to Titanic Weapons and why?

Originally Posted by WolfSoul

I'm just looking forward to someone making the smallest character possible with the largest weapon possible.

I might have to do it myself, just because.

Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow

Completely on a separate topic, it occurs to me that above and beyond the attack animations, two other factors will play a huge role in how many Titanic Weapons characters I make - how the characters stand combat-ready and how the characters walk/run/jog.

Combat stances have always been... Problematic, as ours are left-foot-forward, making a right-handed two-handed weapon a bit... Iffy to animate for. Furthermore, how would YOU envision your Titanic Weapon user standing in combat? Would he/she resemble one of the following:

1. "Sword too heavy!" Character hunched over, sword resting on the ground beside, character lifting only one end by the hilt.

2. "Sword on ma crotch!" Character holds sword with both hands extended down at arm's length, sword pointing up and forward.

3. "I'm a lumberjack and I'm OK!" Sword resting on shoulder, reverse-side down, one hand on the hilt, the other hand at the side only grabbing the hilt when attacking.

4. "I squat to parry!" Sword held horizontally at above head height as though to block with, both hands on the hilt, body crouching slightly, ready for action.

5. "I am a boring person!" Regular left foot forward combat stance, sword held in one hand, swapping to two-handed grip only when attacking.

... (snip)

I'd be interested to hear where you guys stand on the above choices.

Originally Posted by Traumatica

I only wish they *had* the option of Stances in the game... My "super strength" Titan Weapon would surely be the Lumberjack type... But I *looooove* the idea of the drag my weapon around little itty bitty character...

Oh and on a side note... Stance 2 should be the "I see your Schwartz is as big as mine" stance... =P

Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow

Pardon me for hijacking your laugh, but you make a very good point (that others have made before, credit where credit is due), in asking the question of whether Titanic Weapons will have one-handed - presumably RIGHT-handed - animations. For the time being, I want to avoid discussing an entirely one-handed set which would work with shields. Suffice it to say I wouldn't be opposed to this FOR SHIELDS ONLY, as I would pretty much REQUIRE that Titanic Weapons have at least a fair few two-handed attacks.

The question inherent here is "are they justified?" Are one-handed attacks appropriate to a so-called Titanic Weapons set, or would they be unable to convey the full force, weight and impact of the set. This, then, then begs the question of what - speaking of the animations for wielding it - makes a weapon feel big, heavy and powerful? It's not just the weapon model, we can conclude that quite easily, if for no reason other than we're getting a whole new set, rather than new weapons for the old ones. Animation and visual effects clearly play a major role, but what? Well, I think I have at least the foundation of an idea to describe this.

What makes a weapon feel powerful is its sense of inertia and its sense of impact. Impact should be easy to figure out - force explosions on weapon contact, screen shake, loud noise. Not so much for inertia, however. This comes down to how each swing is animated. A weak swing with a light weapon is both fast and precise, meaning it starts close to the target, strikes and ends either on target or shortly thereafter. That's because a weapon user isn't fighting so much momentum to stop his own weapon, and is much more easily capable to halt it and become combat-ready once more without wasting time on weapon breaking distance.

A powerful swing, by contrast, starts far and wide, so that the heavy weapon has time to build up enough speed for a for a forceful impact, and once the weapon strikes, it either goes right through the target and keeps on going or otherwise bowls the target out of the way and keeps on going anyway. Stopping a heavy weapon mid-swing is difficult and takes time. After a certain critical mass and velocity, stopping it actually becomes a liability, and the user is much better served in maintaining weapon momentum while controlling swing direction and circling the weapon around to deliver another blow without needing to speed up and slow down constantly. Hence, the concept of momentum in Titanic Weapons.

But can this be done with one hand? In short, yes, but it depends on how how exaggerated you want that particular attack to be. Drawing on Darksiders' War, he mixes in a fair few one-handed strikes in with his heavier, slower, more powerful two-handed strikes. One-handed attacks are usually his openers - weak and light (within context), but still describing very wide-swinging arcs. Two-handed attacks tend to be his finishers, either a grand slam down on top of enemies or a spinning horizontal sliash, or a sort of top-down diagonal slash across multiple enemies. In fact, one of his stronger combos involves three consecutive hits, each of which includes a turn-around spinning step.

I suspect some imagine that Titanic Weapons could never look right unless you were to spin around with the giant weapon like a very furious dancing couple, and that this would look ugly, but there is leeway in making the set look strong AND varied, to say nothing of cool. The key, I think, is wide-swinging arcs, area effect attacks and animation blending which makes one animation look as though it's feeding into another. Even if the animations themselves are slow, this kind of flow is crucial. You very much CAN maintain a heavy, swinging weapon in perpetual motion without ever turning around, as any Conan fan will tell you. If there's one thing Arnie was good at in that movie (besides being big and muscular), it was swinging that sword from left to right, in an almost believable fashion.

To answer the question at the top of the post - can one-handed animations look as powerful as two-handed ones? Yes, they can, given a good animator. Can a set made up of ENTIRELY one-handed animations look powerful yet still be usable with a shield? Frankly, I don't know. One-handed attacks CAN look as powerful as two-handed ones... Up to a certain point. After that point, though, some of the ludicrously destructive powers I can envision I just don't see working one-handed without being goofy.

Originally Posted by Cheetatron

Way i see it the slower 1 handed attacks would do less damage and have worse DPA and DPS than the faster harder hitting 2 handed attacks, but the one handed attacks would have much better recharge and endurance cost and still be needed for an attack chain

Originally Posted by Santorican

What is the difference between these Titan Weapons, and regular ones?

Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow

Wait, shouldn't one-handed attacks be FASTER? Typically, the game treats weaker attacks as faster, more frequent ones while bigger ones are slower and rarer.

Originally Posted by Arnabas

I remember the days when the devs didn't want to add things that looked "silly" to the game.

I like the idea behind the mechanics of the set, but the weapons look like bad anime weapons.

Originally Posted by Arnabas

I remember the days when the devs didn't want to add things that looked "silly" to the game.

I like the idea behind the mechanics of the set, but the weapons look like bad anime weapons.

Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow

Some days I forget that I'm excited about the new Titanic Weapons set and I get lost in unimportant squabbles over small details. However, whenever I remember how giddy-excited I am about this set, I also remember that if it turns out to be what I think it will be, I may have a LOT of characters to reroll. As such, I want to ask you guys for a bit of fairly general concept help, and hopefully a fun discussion.

Now, to try and formulate a more a more specific question (than even the one in the title), let's go with the following few:

1. Can you think of any concepts that make sense with conventional Weapon sets, but don't make sense with Titanic weapons?

2. Do you have any weapon characters? If so (assuming the set contains all classes of weapons), which ones are you leaving as is, and which ones are you remaking into Titanic weapons? Why?

3. Has hearing about Titanic Weapons given you any new ideas? Has it given you a new spin on old ideas?

Originally Posted by BrandX

I agree with Sam on this one. A lot of those weapon skins we have now. Silly.

Huge swords are in way silly compared to superheroes who go around with a wrench, a shovel, a manhole cover, or look...hey I'm beating the hell out of a heavily armored tank with a baseball bat.

Originally Posted by Doughboy

Same here. I'm not a fan of the giant swords and other huge weapons. Light poles and railroad crossings, sure. A super strength character could lug those around. But the manga-inspired swords as big as the character wielding it? Not my thing.

If you like it, enjoy. If not, I empathize.

Originally Posted by Sapphic_Neko

If the set is good and fun to play, odds are Sapphic Neko will find herself shrunk down a little and wielding an oversized sword and i will be sitting infront of my monitor giggling in glee.

Originally Posted by Lycanus

I must admit, the little girl big sword thing is one I like, however, that look comes from a magic the gathering card way back when I still used to play, a black card from the same set that produced Thrulls there was a card that was similar to the black knight in a way that had multiple images and one of those was a woman reclining on a rock with a huge broadsword that was taller than she was.

Loved the look.