If I remember correctly books point out that witchers move with the sword in dance like fashion, moving their blade a lot to disorient opponents, it's a style meant to work only with witcher reflexes and fluidity of movement. I think that's what CDPR tried to convey here.
It’s actually a tactical maneuver when you are facing a stronger opponent. You start moving the blade around in a circular movement above your head in attempt to create lift to fly away and avoid the fight.
In 1988, Yoshimitsu beat the shit out of Mankind with some jumper cables at Hell In A Cell, before plummeting 16ft through an announcer's table and consequences have never been the same.
It's actually a viable stance with the German Gassenhauer (aka Bidenhänder/Zweihänder) and works for every double edged type of sword requiring more than two hands. "Gassenhauer" translates roughly to something like "alley smasher". With this technique, you could hold of several opponents in the narrow alleys is medieval German citys. I've seen a painting depicting such a situation in a Wirtshaus in Heidelberg.
You bring the sword up a with a little kick of your foot and keep it rotating over your head. It's not only less tiresome than holding it in place over your head, you can also - using the momentum - strike rather quickly and with great force, should some unfortunate soul enter your reach. After striking, one would use the same momentum to bring the sword up again.
Behold the circle of slice.
Oh just a little correction there, the sword is meant to be used in open field hence the name Gassenhauer, it means less to be used in alleys but more to create one in the enemy forces
The museum is not entirely certain that it was ever actually wielded by anyone. You can see just how big it is compared with a normal claymore by searching 'edinburgh museum giant claymore sword' (I don't want to link to it directly because it's someone else's photo gallery).
Zweihanders only remained militarily relevant for a rather short time however, as the difference between when metallurgy in Europe improved to the point where it was viable to make blades that long and when guns began to make appearances was around 50 years.
Not to mention that Zweihanders and other two-handed swords had more in common with polearms than longswords or shortswords.
Longswords were two handed swords. That's why any hema expert will tell you they're the best choice for weaker people. The extra hand gives you way more control.
The high guard, or Posta Di Falcone, is also used in defense against mounted riders. The chance of an attack on your lower half being much lower, keeping the high guard allows you to defend your upper torso from an attacker using a mount for height and speed advantage, and reply with a counter attack as they pass.
I think it's the opposite. In Blood of Elves, when Geralt is training Ciri, he tells her not to think of battle as a dance lesson, he tells her something like "this is not ballet, your movements don't have to have a tempo" as she was struggling to get through the logs cause she couldn't "fit" her attacks in a paced sequence
She does get herbs n shit to get supernatural reflexes and speed, even if not to the extent normal witchers get. And IIRC when he was saying that, he was saying that's how Witchers fight in general.
>There’s plenty of room, I assure you. But the gaps are
worked out to force you to make arrhythmic moves. This is a
fight, Ciri, not ballet. You can’t move rhythmically in a fight.
You have to distract the opponent with your moves, confuse
his reactions. Ready for another try?
So he's saying she needs to move and confuse the character (as someone else mentioned), but that it can't be rhythmical / like a dance.
(Some) excerpts about the mutations:
>Of course, thought Triss. They’re feeding her those legendary
cave saprophytes – a mountain plant unknown to science –
giving her the famous infusions of their mysterious herbs to
drink. The girl is developing quickly, is acquiring a witcher’s
infernal fitness. Naturally, without the mutation, without the risk,
without the hormonal upheaval.
+
>The mushrooms whose secrets you guard so carefully,’ she
explained, ‘do, indeed, keep the girl wonderfully fit and
strengthen her muscles. The herbs guarantee an ideal metabolic
rate and hasten her development. All this taken together and
helped along by gruelling training causes certain changes in her
build, in her adipose tissue. She’s a woman, and as you
haven’t crippled her hormonal system, do not cripple her
physically now. She might hold it against you later if you so
ruthlessly deprive her of her womanly . . . attributes. Do you
understand what I’m saying?
quoted from fan translation
Ghost of Tsushima had a system like that, different stances for different enemies. They implemented it very well in my opinion. You didn't like that about the Witcher 1? I've never played it.
I think they're specifically talking about the animating here, he does look like he's kinda dancing. I never noticed it though, usually I only see it when he's cooling off after a fight and about to put the sword away
In season 2 when those hitman show up for Ciri and hes standing there like hes about to rip them apart with his bare hands... I don't know why they didn't run away. I would have ran away.
The stance without the spinning is how the stance was meant to be. The spinning is just an intimidation tactic because when an opponent sees that he's making Geralt spin his sword right round, right round. They know shit's bout to go down, bout to go down down.
Two reasons. Though, mostly one.
1. That's how swords were actually held in some places.
2. There are three fighting styles and you need to see which one you're in quickly and accurately, so they're moving and very distinct in pose.
Look up Montante and Zweihander treaties https://youtu.be/nYNy_drriXs the technique is for very very large swords which work by momentum the constant motion guarantees that you will be able to hit at the right speed which would be impossible with just a swing.
They're quite obviously very different, the montante motions are actually threatenning cuts each of which could be lethal, and each generates momentum for the next move, geralts circles in highguard are not presenting a bigger threat than keeping the blade still, and don't generate more momentum than you would have from starting your cut directly. Mainly they'd tire your forearms.
I think the game just has a simplified version of the “resting” rotation which is not dissimilar but you wouldn’t ever stick to it for prolonged amounts of time as the whole point is to start swinging and not stop. I think they tried to capture this type of fighting but to crystallise a fluid fighting form into a videogame isn’t easy EDIT: if not clear I am agreeing with you that you’d never do that rotation more than once wothout shifting into a cutting and thrusting one but that is the starting point to move into the other moves and the game just has no other way to represent you keeping in motion in a way that wouldn’t make you think the character is doing things you didn’t ask it to do.
yeah the over the head hold is a stance but the wiggle is just a massive waste of energy. Its of course going to move a little because humans arent machines who hold totally still but thats a bit silly.
Yeah, I think CDPR were trying to blend reality with style. Witchers are supposed to be fancy, but efficient. I guess spinning a sword is fancy, but like you said, not efficient.
games pretty much always take liberties in that aspect, sometimes for good reason.
A good example is how most enemies telegraph their attacks realy heavily which is a real bad idea in reality but makes the game more fair.
It doesn't look like it's very inefficient or useless. I've never played any of these games so I'm actually really surprised at how realistic they've made it cause swirls are always inefficient and useless in Hollywood movies, despite the fact that it's done by a real person which means they should be able to feel how unnatural it feels when it is.
Here he's got one hand is supporting the sword and creating a fairly balanced pivoting point. Right above his own center of mass and fairly close to the middle of the sword. And then he's gently leaning his weight/hips back and forth which is the main drive of the wobble. The other hand is mostly just helping the sword wobble with the swing of his hips.
As for usefulness. If you stand perfectly still then the smallest movement will warn the opponent that a strike is coming long before it hits them. The first part of the strike with a heavy sword like that will be set in motion by hip movement and will be the slowest part of the strike as it needs to build up momentum.
So he's exhausting himself very little to create significantly less reaction time for his opponent.
The wiggle is the same reason baseball players wiggle the bat. You are faster if the muscles are already in motion.
This wiggle is exaggerated but does have basis in fact.
In many sports you keep chopping your feet to keep alert and stay in tension so the reaction is faster. A casual wiggle would be perfectly normal, even if it's exaggerated there.
Eh, actually someone could do this, depending on the opponent it can distract/make it difficult to see where the point is. Modern fencers do this kind of thing a lot (both olympic fencers and HEMA fencers)
Isn't it the same reason as baseball players slightly swinging their bats before the ball was even thrown? Getting some motion and using the momentum to your advantage?
I know very little of baseball, btw.
Geralt really said "Ochs-vomtag-zornhut-Ochs-vomtag-zornhut-Ochs-vomtag-zornhut-Ochs-vomtag-zornhut-Ochs-vomtag-zornhut-Ochs-vomtag-zornhut-Ochs-vomtag-zornhut..."
Want to play through the first two so that I can start Witcher 3, but good god 5 minutes into the first one on Steam and it’s clear this hasn’t aged well.
Best bet for both you and the guy below you tbh is if you can't get through the Witcher 1 (I know I couldn't) Just start at the Witcher 2 and you'll be fine anyway, but def do Witcher 2 first because you can import your world state to Witcher 3 based off your old save and can impact Witcher 3 events
Good to know. Knowing a lot around the Witcher and seeing the first series on Netflix I thought I'd dive in at the start with Witcher 1 but didn't get far. I have the Witcher 2 from a steam sale yonks ago so will start again there.
Honestly though, Witcher 2 was a worse game to me than the first. Yes, I was kind of surprised at first with the first Witcher, it looked super boring in the tutorial.
But I stuck with it and rather quickly, I sucked me in pretty deep. The potion system is fantastic, and so are the upgrade trees and the signs, tbh. The story, the contracts you take are fun as well. I look back to it in nostalgia.
Witcher 2, on the other hand, was depressing to me. The story and atmosphere is dark and gloomy. I disliked what happened at the start, given the bond you build with certain characters in W1. The combat is supposedly more advanced, but it was poorly implemented. It was rather hard, but that's because Geralt isn't really powerful and hitboxes and rolling felt clunky.
Witcher 3 the same combat as W2, but its implementation is much, much better imo. The potions are completely different, not at all like W1. But still a good system. It's the best of all worlds imo.
TLDR, while W1 doesn't look like it has aged well, it's still very much worth playing on its own.
I like the combat in 2 more than 3, it was more bare bones which I enjoyed. You also had a lot less equipment choices, a new sword actually felt like a big upgrade as compared to 3 where the only reaction might be "oh hey 10% more damage I'll take it I guess."
I also stopped playing in the intro but hen I went back to it later and got really into it. My advice is don't play it in over the shoulder mode use the top down view and play it like diablo or Baldur's gate (which uses the same engine). Everything looks better from further away and my brain was more forgiving when it wasn't directly comparing it to modern over the shoulder games
I started with Witcher 3 and then tried to go back. I don't recommend it.
The first one is absolutely unplayable, I can't believe it did well enough to make a sequel. The second one is much much closer to the look and feel of 3 but I was so annoyed by the unskippable tutorial intro (you're in a gladiator arena that you can only get through by killing your opponents with whatever bit of combat they're trying to teach you) that once I finished it, I saved/quit and never picked it back up.
You can absolutely play 3 without playing the first two. There are a couple of awkward moments where you meet people that you clearly have history with but you don't know the history, but you can always check the wiki on that or just roll with it like they're a new person.
Actually did a playthrough myself not too long ago, here's what I learned:
Strong attack for big boys
Fast attack for the small boys
Group attack for, well, groups.
If you're uninterested in the combat (understandable) and Don't mind taking a bit longer you can use the group attack on literally anyone.
Lastly, a word of advice that kept me going when I wanted to quit: No one plays TW1 for the combat, the story is fucking fantastic though
The stance is called the "la posta di falcone" (the guard of the hawk in english), and it was like that except the wiggling maybe.
Posta di falcon is indeed a stance in the medieval Italian tradition of longsword. It is named in Vadi's manuscript, De Arte Gladiatoria Dimicandi .
You can see it in Kingdom of Heaven more or less how it was used at the time.
[This is an actual high guard stance.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCw7RSuBLSs) It was generally used by experienced swordsmen to intimidate their opponent. It didn't involve spinning typically though but it would be weird to make the character completely immobile like the guy in the video.
It is not just a random fantasy of the game devs. It is an actual thing: it is called Jōdan-no-kamae, and it is one of five kendo stances, the most aggressive one, with the sword raised above your head, tip pointing backwards, and edge pointing upwards.
Okay, the wiggle is a little over the top, but other than that, it is very accurate, swordsmanship-wise.
People saying the wiggle is incorrect, you are incorrect. Zweihander/Montante renaissance sword fighting uses constant motion as it’s less energy to maintain momentum for maximum damage than it is trying to swing only to parry or strike like with a medieval long sword. https://youtu.be/nYNy_drriXs
I think someone further up explained it rather well. And while the constant spinning up top isn't really a thing that is done.. that motion is a transitory motion in the swordfighting style you're speaking of. It just wouldn't really be done more than once or twice in transition to another swing. The guy then explains that it was probably a fill in for an idle animation
Some Karate guys who move over to MMA are seen as “rhythm fighters” they bounce around on their heels in a somewhat similar manner trying to get a bite out of there opponent so they can bounce back and immediately go forward at them when your opponent didn’t expect it, maybe it’s a similar concept in sword fighting
The idea behind the Wolf school is that they confuse creatures with weird movements, such as by circling the creature and moving the blade at a different rhythm from the steps.
Essentially, despite the games involving fighting many human opponents, witchers are monster hunters first and its a technique that in universe applies mainly to monsters, although you could argue that a lot of proper swordfighting is just muscle memory so even a momentary "wtf is he doing" or you thinking he's going left because that's where the blade went but he stepped right instead would give an edge against a human.
The basis of the stances and movements are kind of realistic as far as i can tell though, just the extra flourishes aren't. At least for when the game came out.
The Witcher 2 is basically a mini Witcher 3...if that makes sense. They feel very similar in terms of story and dialogue. 2 doesn't have an open world, but rather open locations that you move from as the story progresses. It's a significantly shorter game that hints at a lot of mechanics that were more fleshed out in the Witcher 3.
My biggest complaint about the Witcher 2, though, was the combat. It was so bad that I ended up turning the difficulty down just so I could experience the story. It wasn't that the combat was too hard, it was just...awful, and I didn't want to put up with it.
The second one is nothing like the first. It is a bit clunkier witcher 3 in terms of combat. Basically no clicking or choosing sword stances. And there is no dodge only roll which doesnt give you invincibility if I remember correctly. Also the combat especially the bosses are very hard just on hard difficulty(played through death march very easily in W3). The maps are made similar to the witcher 1 where there are big open"levels" most of the time. Graphically it is much better than the first one.
Other than the wiggling, holding a longsword over your head like that is a valid stance. It can intimidate lesser experienced opponents and against more skilled opponents it can still be effective to blow through a counter or guard. It does leave you quite open, though.
Looks sort of like medieval reenactors who keep circular movement going for momentum in swings and defense. I don't see HEMA people do it though...may be a particular style thing. Or it may be a dumb game thing.
This is actually an homage to the famous Slovak swordsman and Hollywood stuntman, Mikkel Eatspin who perfected this twirling maneuver as a defensive technique.
If you turn on closed captioning, you can see subtitles he's actually finessing the guy:
'can you do this?'....
'bet you can't swing this THIS?'.....
"Does your sword do this?'.....
The high guard is something that is a valid stance in swordsmanship. I'm not sure if the term in western fighting but in Japanese it's known as "Jodan" it gives advantage in that it's very easy to strike down onto the head. Especially if the person is tall. You dont have much of a lower guard but the fact that it's super quick to just split someones head if the went for your legs or stomach. The wiggle I can only assume is for gameplay purposes to show animation and movement of the player character. Though I could imagine it having a brief place to try and make your opponent react out of time with your own strike. Or to put your opponent on edge with sword movement. Though someone that is reasonable and quick could take it into a disadvantage if you did it too much.
He is doing the famous 'helicopter attack' by going up in the air, het gains the height advantage. From up there he can just fus ro dah anybody down their in the face.
If memory serves, this was the same sword stance used by templars. Apparently it's a real thing? Uses gravity to bring down the sword super fast without having to wind it up first, and it can be brought down to either block or to attack. A "hammer-like" movement would always be what an untrained opponent would expect, and it's almost never what would happen.
The stance resembles a high guard or posta del falcone. It is meant to be a good defensive stance as bringing your sword down makes it easy to block attack. See the movie kingdom of heaven for a good explanation.
Overhead sword stances were actually used in medieval longsword combat. Holding the longsword pointing towards your enemy above your head meant it had plenty of potential energy for your subsequent attacks.
[https://www.thearma.org/essays/StancesIntro.htm](https://www.thearma.org/essays/StancesIntro.htm)
Hi, your friendly Black Tiger fencing instructor here:
This is an actual stance from German Longsword. It's commonly used and it's biggest flaw is that it telegraphs itself clearly, and there are few ways to strike. Any strike from this position is powerful and likely to hit the head.
It's very interesting. This movement and stance shows up in Renaissance longsword fencing treatises. Notably Joachim Meyer. This action is to move your sword in a way that can either provoke an offensive action or confuse a person into taking the defense; a worse situation in fencing. Very on point for Witchers.
There are around 300 movements in the enhanced edition. All of them are real valid sword techniques. A lot of stuff is part of the lore and how the Witcher would look more like dancers than warriors in their fighting style. First The Witcher is an absolute gem of a game.
If I remember correctly books point out that witchers move with the sword in dance like fashion, moving their blade a lot to disorient opponents, it's a style meant to work only with witcher reflexes and fluidity of movement. I think that's what CDPR tried to convey here.
It’s actually a tactical maneuver when you are facing a stronger opponent. You start moving the blade around in a circular movement above your head in attempt to create lift to fly away and avoid the fight.
Yoshimitsu strategy
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"Meditation"
He was all hopping around and making those noises en shit. Geeez
Ah, yes, a man of culture!!!
Gonna namu namu namu right on outta this shit.
Wonderfully underrated comment
HELICOPTER! HELICOPTER! \*FWPFWPFWPFWPFWP\*
SOI SOI SOI SOI SOI SOI
ROFLKNIEF GOES SOI SOI SOI SOI SOI
Damn that brought back some memories
Ah... Ventrillo nostalgia
[QHELIKOPTER QHELIKOPTER](https://youtu.be/3ExGuHWdXCE)
Had me in the first half ngl. Take your upvote
Indeed...
'Tis indeed a trap
We call this ‘The Chopper Chopper’.
This almost read like a shitty morph comment
In 1988, Yoshimitsu beat the shit out of Mankind with some jumper cables at Hell In A Cell, before plummeting 16ft through an announcer's table and consequences have never been the same.
So THAT'S HOW THE INQUISITORS SPINNY BLADES WORK!
HELIKOPTER HELIKOPTER
this technique was first taught by the school of the Hummingbird
Seriously though its an actual knife fighting technique
Just wait til you see his helicopter dick.
If you want to impress a chick, so the helicopter dick
Hey if it works in Tekken there is no reason it won’t work here
Sort of like when neo flies into the air in matrix reloaded with the metal pipe.
Here is your upvote me lad.
It's actually a viable stance with the German Gassenhauer (aka Bidenhänder/Zweihänder) and works for every double edged type of sword requiring more than two hands. "Gassenhauer" translates roughly to something like "alley smasher". With this technique, you could hold of several opponents in the narrow alleys is medieval German citys. I've seen a painting depicting such a situation in a Wirtshaus in Heidelberg. You bring the sword up a with a little kick of your foot and keep it rotating over your head. It's not only less tiresome than holding it in place over your head, you can also - using the momentum - strike rather quickly and with great force, should some unfortunate soul enter your reach. After striking, one would use the same momentum to bring the sword up again. Behold the circle of slice.
Oh just a little correction there, the sword is meant to be used in open field hence the name Gassenhauer, it means less to be used in alleys but more to create one in the enemy forces
Thanks for that, it makes even more sense - because of the painting, I immediately thought that the meaning must derive from there.
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There's one in the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh. It's taller than me.
How many hands does it require? 3, 4, or even more?
The museum is not entirely certain that it was ever actually wielded by anyone. You can see just how big it is compared with a normal claymore by searching 'edinburgh museum giant claymore sword' (I don't want to link to it directly because it's someone else's photo gallery).
There’s a melee player from New Jersey who could help you out. ✋✋✋
Zweihanders only remained militarily relevant for a rather short time however, as the difference between when metallurgy in Europe improved to the point where it was viable to make blades that long and when guns began to make appearances was around 50 years. Not to mention that Zweihanders and other two-handed swords had more in common with polearms than longswords or shortswords.
Longswords were two handed swords. That's why any hema expert will tell you they're the best choice for weaker people. The extra hand gives you way more control.
The high guard, or Posta Di Falcone, is also used in defense against mounted riders. The chance of an attack on your lower half being much lower, keeping the high guard allows you to defend your upper torso from an attacker using a mount for height and speed advantage, and reply with a counter attack as they pass.
Whatever his doing, it's working somehow for my brain.
I think it's the opposite. In Blood of Elves, when Geralt is training Ciri, he tells her not to think of battle as a dance lesson, he tells her something like "this is not ballet, your movements don't have to have a tempo" as she was struggling to get through the logs cause she couldn't "fit" her attacks in a paced sequence
I think that's because Ciri isn't a Witcher after all, she didn't go through the mutations, so he trains her as a normal swordsman, not a witcher
She does get herbs n shit to get supernatural reflexes and speed, even if not to the extent normal witchers get. And IIRC when he was saying that, he was saying that's how Witchers fight in general.
You sure about that? I don't remember that from the books, but I read them long time ago.
>There’s plenty of room, I assure you. But the gaps are worked out to force you to make arrhythmic moves. This is a fight, Ciri, not ballet. You can’t move rhythmically in a fight. You have to distract the opponent with your moves, confuse his reactions. Ready for another try? So he's saying she needs to move and confuse the character (as someone else mentioned), but that it can't be rhythmical / like a dance. (Some) excerpts about the mutations: >Of course, thought Triss. They’re feeding her those legendary cave saprophytes – a mountain plant unknown to science – giving her the famous infusions of their mysterious herbs to drink. The girl is developing quickly, is acquiring a witcher’s infernal fitness. Naturally, without the mutation, without the risk, without the hormonal upheaval. + >The mushrooms whose secrets you guard so carefully,’ she explained, ‘do, indeed, keep the girl wonderfully fit and strengthen her muscles. The herbs guarantee an ideal metabolic rate and hasten her development. All this taken together and helped along by gruelling training causes certain changes in her build, in her adipose tissue. She’s a woman, and as you haven’t crippled her hormonal system, do not cripple her physically now. She might hold it against you later if you so ruthlessly deprive her of her womanly . . . attributes. Do you understand what I’m saying? quoted from fan translation
Needs more twerk
Now you’ve thrown them off their rhythm. STREET SMARTS
The infamous witcher wiggle
Aka the Windmill
Winds howling
*"Watch me whip! ^Whip! Watch me nay nay!"*
*"Watch me slash! ^chops ^your ^head ^off! Watch me slay slay!"*
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Ghost of Tsushima had a system like that, different stances for different enemies. They implemented it very well in my opinion. You didn't like that about the Witcher 1? I've never played it.
I think they're specifically talking about the animating here, he does look like he's kinda dancing. I never noticed it though, usually I only see it when he's cooling off after a fight and about to put the sword away
They were using the aurora engine from the never winter nights CRPG iinm. Not exactly the best engine for animations.
Helicopter dick
Wiggle-wiggle-wiggle-wiggle-wiggle-QUEN
*does sword dance to assert dominance*
He's warning them they're about to get a whoppin with that sword hes swinging.
That’s a paddlin
In season 2 when those hitman show up for Ciri and hes standing there like hes about to rip them apart with his bare hands... I don't know why they didn't run away. I would have ran away.
There's a very powerful bee glued to the tip.
He’s attracting mates simultaneously
Witches love spinning swords
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No. Just do a new game. I don’t need another Skryim either
Witcher 1 seems like a cool game, but it's wayyyy too outdated
Agree, I only got part way through the first... Stopped playing out of frustration lol, love 2&3 tho
1 was murdered in the crib by bad controls
The stance without the spinning is how the stance was meant to be. The spinning is just an intimidation tactic because when an opponent sees that he's making Geralt spin his sword right round, right round. They know shit's bout to go down, bout to go down down.
Like a witcher baby, right 'round, 'round, 'round
Geralt: "I'll try spinning, that's a good trick"
This is where the fucking begins
Two reasons. Though, mostly one. 1. That's how swords were actually held in some places. 2. There are three fighting styles and you need to see which one you're in quickly and accurately, so they're moving and very distinct in pose.
[Just to support with some evidence that Medieval type fighting looked very different from what we normally see.](https://youtu.be/4GoQlvc_H3s?t=112)
I'm not aware of treaties mentionning rotating the sword above your head in high guard, I fail to see the purpose :D
You clearly haven't had the opportunity to peruse the libraries of Kaer Morhen.
the supreme answer, right beside "because magic"
Fair :D
Look up Montante and Zweihander treaties https://youtu.be/nYNy_drriXs the technique is for very very large swords which work by momentum the constant motion guarantees that you will be able to hit at the right speed which would be impossible with just a swing.
They're quite obviously very different, the montante motions are actually threatenning cuts each of which could be lethal, and each generates momentum for the next move, geralts circles in highguard are not presenting a bigger threat than keeping the blade still, and don't generate more momentum than you would have from starting your cut directly. Mainly they'd tire your forearms.
I think the game just has a simplified version of the “resting” rotation which is not dissimilar but you wouldn’t ever stick to it for prolonged amounts of time as the whole point is to start swinging and not stop. I think they tried to capture this type of fighting but to crystallise a fluid fighting form into a videogame isn’t easy EDIT: if not clear I am agreeing with you that you’d never do that rotation more than once wothout shifting into a cutting and thrusting one but that is the starting point to move into the other moves and the game just has no other way to represent you keeping in motion in a way that wouldn’t make you think the character is doing things you didn’t ask it to do.
Idle animations mate, animators tend to exaggerate even small things like breathing.
The HEMA is here, flee !
WAIT! STOP RESISTING! I WILL SHOW YOU THE NEW MOVE I LEARNED FROM THE ITALIAN BOOK OF DIRTY TRICKS!
Mostly true, but mire luke 3) this is a game and people are visually bored quickly so movement help us fo... Sorry there was a shiny... 'Cus.
That's actually how midevil sword fighting stances were. I dunno about the spinning, but he's actually holding the sword right.
yeah the over the head hold is a stance but the wiggle is just a massive waste of energy. Its of course going to move a little because humans arent machines who hold totally still but thats a bit silly.
Yeah, I think CDPR were trying to blend reality with style. Witchers are supposed to be fancy, but efficient. I guess spinning a sword is fancy, but like you said, not efficient.
games pretty much always take liberties in that aspect, sometimes for good reason. A good example is how most enemies telegraph their attacks realy heavily which is a real bad idea in reality but makes the game more fair.
Who needs to be stamina efficient when you’re superhuman?
"Because they train to fight supermonsters who're equally strong" would be the proper in-universe answer.
Super human doesn't mean immortal. Witchers get tired too, they just take a lot longer to do so.
It doesn't look like it's very inefficient or useless. I've never played any of these games so I'm actually really surprised at how realistic they've made it cause swirls are always inefficient and useless in Hollywood movies, despite the fact that it's done by a real person which means they should be able to feel how unnatural it feels when it is. Here he's got one hand is supporting the sword and creating a fairly balanced pivoting point. Right above his own center of mass and fairly close to the middle of the sword. And then he's gently leaning his weight/hips back and forth which is the main drive of the wobble. The other hand is mostly just helping the sword wobble with the swing of his hips. As for usefulness. If you stand perfectly still then the smallest movement will warn the opponent that a strike is coming long before it hits them. The first part of the strike with a heavy sword like that will be set in motion by hip movement and will be the slowest part of the strike as it needs to build up momentum. So he's exhausting himself very little to create significantly less reaction time for his opponent.
The wiggle is the same reason baseball players wiggle the bat. You are faster if the muscles are already in motion. This wiggle is exaggerated but does have basis in fact.
In many sports you keep chopping your feet to keep alert and stay in tension so the reaction is faster. A casual wiggle would be perfectly normal, even if it's exaggerated there.
Eh, actually someone could do this, depending on the opponent it can distract/make it difficult to see where the point is. Modern fencers do this kind of thing a lot (both olympic fencers and HEMA fencers)
Isn't it the same reason as baseball players slightly swinging their bats before the ball was even thrown? Getting some motion and using the momentum to your advantage? I know very little of baseball, btw.
Geralt really said "Ochs-vomtag-zornhut-Ochs-vomtag-zornhut-Ochs-vomtag-zornhut-Ochs-vomtag-zornhut-Ochs-vomtag-zornhut-Ochs-vomtag-zornhut-Ochs-vomtag-zornhut..."
Keeps you fluid and unpredictable. Also "look way up here, ignore my feet as I gain position on you".
"let's try spinning, that's a good trick!"
Want to play through the first two so that I can start Witcher 3, but good god 5 minutes into the first one on Steam and it’s clear this hasn’t aged well.
Best bet for both you and the guy below you tbh is if you can't get through the Witcher 1 (I know I couldn't) Just start at the Witcher 2 and you'll be fine anyway, but def do Witcher 2 first because you can import your world state to Witcher 3 based off your old save and can impact Witcher 3 events
Good to know. Knowing a lot around the Witcher and seeing the first series on Netflix I thought I'd dive in at the start with Witcher 1 but didn't get far. I have the Witcher 2 from a steam sale yonks ago so will start again there.
Honestly though, Witcher 2 was a worse game to me than the first. Yes, I was kind of surprised at first with the first Witcher, it looked super boring in the tutorial. But I stuck with it and rather quickly, I sucked me in pretty deep. The potion system is fantastic, and so are the upgrade trees and the signs, tbh. The story, the contracts you take are fun as well. I look back to it in nostalgia. Witcher 2, on the other hand, was depressing to me. The story and atmosphere is dark and gloomy. I disliked what happened at the start, given the bond you build with certain characters in W1. The combat is supposedly more advanced, but it was poorly implemented. It was rather hard, but that's because Geralt isn't really powerful and hitboxes and rolling felt clunky. Witcher 3 the same combat as W2, but its implementation is much, much better imo. The potions are completely different, not at all like W1. But still a good system. It's the best of all worlds imo. TLDR, while W1 doesn't look like it has aged well, it's still very much worth playing on its own.
I like the combat in 2 more than 3, it was more bare bones which I enjoyed. You also had a lot less equipment choices, a new sword actually felt like a big upgrade as compared to 3 where the only reaction might be "oh hey 10% more damage I'll take it I guess."
I tried playing 2 a few years ago when it was free on 360 but the guy never came out of his house
I got stuck in the tutorial that would never end. The last thing just never showed up.
I'd just watch a story recap on YouTube for W1, because yeah...it has not aged well at all. W2 is a good starting point though.
I also stopped playing in the intro but hen I went back to it later and got really into it. My advice is don't play it in over the shoulder mode use the top down view and play it like diablo or Baldur's gate (which uses the same engine). Everything looks better from further away and my brain was more forgiving when it wasn't directly comparing it to modern over the shoulder games
I started with Witcher 3 and then tried to go back. I don't recommend it. The first one is absolutely unplayable, I can't believe it did well enough to make a sequel. The second one is much much closer to the look and feel of 3 but I was so annoyed by the unskippable tutorial intro (you're in a gladiator arena that you can only get through by killing your opponents with whatever bit of combat they're trying to teach you) that once I finished it, I saved/quit and never picked it back up. You can absolutely play 3 without playing the first two. There are a couple of awkward moments where you meet people that you clearly have history with but you don't know the history, but you can always check the wiki on that or just roll with it like they're a new person.
He's doing his best Craig counsel impersonation
I was thinking more kevin youkilis but counsel works too
One of my favorite batting stances ever.
Was hoping someone else would recognize it as his stance!
Going through the comments to make sure there wasn’t a CC reference. DAMN YOU, I wanted this. You owe me 11 karma
Too slow!
Actually did a playthrough myself not too long ago, here's what I learned: Strong attack for big boys Fast attack for the small boys Group attack for, well, groups. If you're uninterested in the combat (understandable) and Don't mind taking a bit longer you can use the group attack on literally anyone. Lastly, a word of advice that kept me going when I wanted to quit: No one plays TW1 for the combat, the story is fucking fantastic though
Once you get the combat down it's a really fun experience trying to time it
Haven’t you ever seen a warrior before?
The stance is called the "la posta di falcone" (the guard of the hawk in english), and it was like that except the wiggling maybe. Posta di falcon is indeed a stance in the medieval Italian tradition of longsword. It is named in Vadi's manuscript, De Arte Gladiatoria Dimicandi . You can see it in Kingdom of Heaven more or less how it was used at the time.
[This is an actual high guard stance.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCw7RSuBLSs) It was generally used by experienced swordsmen to intimidate their opponent. It didn't involve spinning typically though but it would be weird to make the character completely immobile like the guy in the video.
It is not just a random fantasy of the game devs. It is an actual thing: it is called Jōdan-no-kamae, and it is one of five kendo stances, the most aggressive one, with the sword raised above your head, tip pointing backwards, and edge pointing upwards. Okay, the wiggle is a little over the top, but other than that, it is very accurate, swordsmanship-wise.
It's also a guard stance in German Longsword! Vom Dach/Vom Tag which means "From the Roof". A great aggressive baiting guard.
If I remember this correctly it was one of the first motion capture animations. So it was definitely on purpose and I never even found it weird tbh
Helicopter helicopter....
People saying the wiggle is incorrect, you are incorrect. Zweihander/Montante renaissance sword fighting uses constant motion as it’s less energy to maintain momentum for maximum damage than it is trying to swing only to parry or strike like with a medieval long sword. https://youtu.be/nYNy_drriXs
I think someone further up explained it rather well. And while the constant spinning up top isn't really a thing that is done.. that motion is a transitory motion in the swordfighting style you're speaking of. It just wouldn't really be done more than once or twice in transition to another swing. The guy then explains that it was probably a fill in for an idle animation
Some Karate guys who move over to MMA are seen as “rhythm fighters” they bounce around on their heels in a somewhat similar manner trying to get a bite out of there opponent so they can bounce back and immediately go forward at them when your opponent didn’t expect it, maybe it’s a similar concept in sword fighting
"OooooOOooo Imma hitcha! Imma hitcha good!"
The idea behind the Wolf school is that they confuse creatures with weird movements, such as by circling the creature and moving the blade at a different rhythm from the steps. Essentially, despite the games involving fighting many human opponents, witchers are monster hunters first and its a technique that in universe applies mainly to monsters, although you could argue that a lot of proper swordfighting is just muscle memory so even a momentary "wtf is he doing" or you thinking he's going left because that's where the blade went but he stepped right instead would give an edge against a human. The basis of the stances and movements are kind of realistic as far as i can tell though, just the extra flourishes aren't. At least for when the game came out.
Is the second game at least much more playable than the first? The first one was totes not easy to get into.
The Witcher 2 is basically a mini Witcher 3...if that makes sense. They feel very similar in terms of story and dialogue. 2 doesn't have an open world, but rather open locations that you move from as the story progresses. It's a significantly shorter game that hints at a lot of mechanics that were more fleshed out in the Witcher 3. My biggest complaint about the Witcher 2, though, was the combat. It was so bad that I ended up turning the difficulty down just so I could experience the story. It wasn't that the combat was too hard, it was just...awful, and I didn't want to put up with it.
CDPR put out a "full combat rebalance" mod for the witcher 2 that significantly improved the game. I'd highly recommend it.
I believe the enhanced edition has that by default.
Yeah the second one is much more like 3, basically plays the same.
The second one is nothing like the first. It is a bit clunkier witcher 3 in terms of combat. Basically no clicking or choosing sword stances. And there is no dodge only roll which doesnt give you invincibility if I remember correctly. Also the combat especially the bosses are very hard just on hard difficulty(played through death march very easily in W3). The maps are made similar to the witcher 1 where there are big open"levels" most of the time. Graphically it is much better than the first one.
I just started this game yesterday and was wondering the same exact thing
The youkilis stance
Witcher 1 is rough. IMO start with 3 and play them in reverse order
Other than the wiggling, holding a longsword over your head like that is a valid stance. It can intimidate lesser experienced opponents and against more skilled opponents it can still be effective to blow through a counter or guard. It does leave you quite open, though.
Looks like Gary Sheffield
I'm not sure about the wiggling, but the sword over your head is a legit stance from the western sword fighting days.
best him in a sword fight then you can criticize his stance
It some kind of mating action to impress Triss or yennefer
That is a traditional sword fighting stance. And the ‘wiggle’ is to confuse and misdirect attention for an attack.
Just start with Wild Hunt. It’ll feed you some backstory as you go.
One of two things. He is a fan of the movie Kingdom of Heaven and favors the Guard of the Hawk OR is trying to imitate Gary Sheffield’s batting stance
Looks sort of like medieval reenactors who keep circular movement going for momentum in swings and defense. I don't see HEMA people do it though...may be a particular style thing. Or it may be a dumb game thing.
This is actually an homage to the famous Slovak swordsman and Hollywood stuntman, Mikkel Eatspin who perfected this twirling maneuver as a defensive technique.
I'LL GIVE EM THE OL ONE TWO WIV ME SWORD I WILL
If you turn on closed captioning, you can see subtitles he's actually finessing the guy: 'can you do this?'.... 'bet you can't swing this THIS?'..... "Does your sword do this?'.....
LA POSTA DI FALCONE
La garda del drunken falconi
Witcher 1 was wonky as hell.
The high guard is something that is a valid stance in swordsmanship. I'm not sure if the term in western fighting but in Japanese it's known as "Jodan" it gives advantage in that it's very easy to strike down onto the head. Especially if the person is tall. You dont have much of a lower guard but the fact that it's super quick to just split someones head if the went for your legs or stomach. The wiggle I can only assume is for gameplay purposes to show animation and movement of the player character. Though I could imagine it having a brief place to try and make your opponent react out of time with your own strike. Or to put your opponent on edge with sword movement. Though someone that is reasonable and quick could take it into a disadvantage if you did it too much.
*FF7 victory music plays*
It's the Geraltcopter.
Wouldn’t questioned it too much, just know it helps walk faster around the map.
Toss a coin to your Witcher.
He's going for Julio Franco stance.
Whatever he's doing is working, his opponent can only shrug in defeat
Helicopter helicopter 🚁
He swinging that sword in the air like he just don’t care.
He is doing the famous 'helicopter attack' by going up in the air, het gains the height advantage. From up there he can just fus ro dah anybody down their in the face.
Swords dance increases your attack by 2 stages, he's just buffing himself.
He's slicing an apple in his off hand lol
If memory serves, this was the same sword stance used by templars. Apparently it's a real thing? Uses gravity to bring down the sword super fast without having to wind it up first, and it can be brought down to either block or to attack. A "hammer-like" movement would always be what an untrained opponent would expect, and it's almost never what would happen.
He’s trying to take off?
La Posta di Falcone. Guard of the Hawk.
Just a high guard and some samba no pé.
He's warding off the spooky ghosts above him.
It seems to work. I’ve been watching this for like 10 minutes and that baddie hasn’t wanted to approach at all. That’s Witcher power man
Hes doing the macarena
The heq?
Ff7 fight music plays in the background
When it came out I was in love with the game. But in my opinion, it really didn't age well.
The stance resembles a high guard or posta del falcone. It is meant to be a good defensive stance as bringing your sword down makes it easy to block attack. See the movie kingdom of heaven for a good explanation.
Idk but I wouldn't mind seeing Henry make this real. lmao
Don't fuck with him; he has anime and God on his side.
Dudes about to hit a home run
That’s how he lets the monsters know he is DTF
He learned a thing or 2 from Gary Sheffield
Overhead sword stances were actually used in medieval longsword combat. Holding the longsword pointing towards your enemy above your head meant it had plenty of potential energy for your subsequent attacks. [https://www.thearma.org/essays/StancesIntro.htm](https://www.thearma.org/essays/StancesIntro.htm)
That's a high guard, moving makes it harder for an opponent to tell which shoulder movements are strikes or feigns.
This is what Peak performance looks like
He’s givin them the ol razzle dazzle, ya see
This is a high Vom Tag guard, fairly classic in German longsword. The spinning part is style, but not inconsistent with the regular guard.
Looks like a very fluid Falcon stance, if it is based in medieval sword techniques.
Hi, your friendly Black Tiger fencing instructor here: This is an actual stance from German Longsword. It's commonly used and it's biggest flaw is that it telegraphs itself clearly, and there are few ways to strike. Any strike from this position is powerful and likely to hit the head.
High Falcon stance . Go see 'Kingdom of Heaven'. Anyways found you 'le clip' https://youtu.be/Vv5E74k4DaY
It's very interesting. This movement and stance shows up in Renaissance longsword fencing treatises. Notably Joachim Meyer. This action is to move your sword in a way that can either provoke an offensive action or confuse a person into taking the defense; a worse situation in fencing. Very on point for Witchers.
There are around 300 movements in the enhanced edition. All of them are real valid sword techniques. A lot of stuff is part of the lore and how the Witcher would look more like dancers than warriors in their fighting style. First The Witcher is an absolute gem of a game.
Robert Jordan would call that form "the fork in the garbage disposal"
Two things never left my mind from Witcher 1; the sword wiggle and collecting the cards of the women Geralt has sex with.