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The Witcher 2 getting full combat rebalance mod with new animations and big changes

Along with all the info released for TW3 the gameplay designer for the series said he is making a mod that changes some stuff for the combat in TW2. Most notably are animation changes which were a big gripe for me personally, also interesting are the effects like enemies exploding after killing them with Igni.

A full list of changes has appeared and it's far bigger than we could ever have hoped for

The changelog is gigantic:
GENERAL CHANGES

Up to 80% increase in responsivness per Geralt's animations.
Up to 50% increase in repsonsivness per NPCs animations.
Added strafing while being locked on an enemy and walking.
Geralt can block while moving ( NEW ANIMATIONS ). Static Guard Stance is no longer required to parry enemy attacks.
Geralt automatically parries enemy sword attacks and deflects incoming arrows.
Geralt and his attackers are no longer bouncing off parry. It allows to continue attack sequence.
Monster attacks still cannot be parried with a sword.
While using Guard Stance Geralt channels an active Quen shield.
Above listed changes to defence mechanics decreased importance of rolling in combat.




CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT

Decreased the number of skill to ensure quality over quantity.
Geralt now starts with core witcher skills already learned. No need to go through Training tree before unlocking other branches.
Removed many passives from skill tree to replace them with more active abilities. Remaining passives are changed to make them more attractive.
All skills now have one level ( previously 2 ).
Aard and Igni Signs have been changed from projectile to cone area of effect.
Riposte doesn't require Guard Stance to activate, only attacking in a timed window.
Changed riposte animations ( NEW ANIMATIONS, DUH ) to prevent Geralt from sliding on enemies.
Experience points are given only for progressing through quests, not for killing enemies. This encourages role-playing without worrying about missing experience.
Geralt no longer buys witcher specific recipies from random merchants. He recalls lost memories as a part of character development.




BALANCE

Each enemy is balanced according to his constitution, combat skill, combat style, weapon and armor type. Following this pattern allowed to created consistent rules that every character follows. A barechested bandit won't survive more hits than a knight in platemail just because the bandit was encountered later in game.
Decreased the disproportion in stats between starting equipment and late game equipment.
Moved the weight of character power from equipment to character development. Learned skills should have as big impact on Geralt's badass factor as items.
Geralt's armors are split into 4 categories: leather jackets, heavy leather jackets, combat jackets and heavy combat jackets. Heavier armors impose small damage penalty on Geralt. Players need to choose between max damage and protection.
Items imported from The Witcher savegames are of the same quality as in the first game. An exceptional armor and weapon remains valuable. This makes the game easier, but it is an intentional reward.
Set elixirs and oils duration to 1 hour.
Added potion overdose and heavy overdose debuffs on toxicity thresholds 55 and 65.
Removed Fatigue penalty that decreased sword damage and damage reduction on block when Vigor was spent on Signs or Parry. It discouraged some players from using Signs becaused it decreased Geralt's sword DPS.
NPCs deal full damage to other NPCs.
Removed 50% Hit Points condition for throwing enemy off height with Aard.
Decreased Riposte damage multiplier to 1.0, but added 30% enemy parry chance debuff.
Riposte no longer costs Vigor.
Silver throwing daggers are considered as silver weapons for damage calculations against monsters.
Inceneration, Bleeding and Poisoning effects are allowed to be active at the same time.
Made quest experience rewards more consistent. There are no longer any situations where player is rewarded with 50 experience points for one quests and 2000 for another.
Made moral choices in quests equally rewarding in terms of experience and items. Players should be encouraged more to role-play instead of weighing quest rewards.
Geralt gains knowledge about monsters faster.
Changed rewards for gaining knowledge about monsters to monster specific oils for swords.
Set minimal damage dealt by Geralt to zero ( was 5 ).
Removed bonus damage for backstabs.
Finally soaked boots in tutorial weigh more than dry boots!!




ECONOMY

Decreased the number of armors and weapons present in game. Amount of equipment is adjusted to provide smoother item progression without making huge amount of items useless stat-wise.
Weapons and armors that are present in the game were picked according to these rules: visual differentiation, witcher low level magic setting. Some items available in game assets but not used in original game were reintroduced.
Moved more quality items from quest rewards to shops and distributed them among Chapters. Player should be encouraged to regulary spend money in shops.
Decreased buying cost of swords and armors. Player should be able to buy items more often, not hoard money.
Decreased amount of loot dropped from enemies.
Removed some of the junk items from container definitions.
Made vendors specialize in certain type of merchandize.
Witcher specific recipies cannot be bought but also cannot be sold to merchants.




VISUALS

Added Focused Combat Stance. Geralt enters focused state during challenging encounters.
While in Focused Stance Geralt performs piruettes ( NEW ANIMATION ) instead of rolling and uses Guard Stance idle animation.
Enemies explode when killed by mage spells. Does not apply to witcher Signs - they are not that powerful.
Made finisher animations which use Signs unlocked by upgrading Aard and Igni in character development.
Removed cutscene swords. Geralt will use his currently equipped sword in all cutscenes.
Equipped enemies with swords according to their social status, wealth and current situation in the game. For example, soldiers patrolling areas near ghost fog in Act 2 are equipped with silver swords like the story suggests.
Decreased camera shake effect used on each step of huge creatures like trolls and golems.
Removed green cloud effect from enemy poisoning FX.




FIXES

Tweaked anim events in all combat animations to improve timings and responsivness.
Fixed sword oils not providing bonus damge against monsters.
Fixed Circle of Power: Endurance giving Circle of Power: Vitality bonus.
Fixed a bug where Geralt was always doing 2 more steps after roll before stopping.




OTHER

Changed item rarity names to reflect witcher's low level magic setting. Items are no longer MAGICAL and EPIC.
Decreased attacked enemy importance for targetting to make switching enemies easier.
Many, many other changes that were required to make features listed above work.

Source

The mod is out now go download it below :D
http://redkit.cdprojektred.com/index.php?c=mod&m=show&p=77

Link appears to be broken or down so here
CDRED posted a link on the forums!

Dat 6mb/s speed.
 

Izick

Member
Now this [CD Projekt Red] is a developer, people. Updating their game for the better over 2 years later, with a new installment on the horizon.
 

danthefan

Member
Cool, I didn't really like combat in TW2 and gave up because of it. Really looking forward to this update, will have another go at the game once it's out.

And yes the support CDPR provide for their games is superb.
 
You know, I never got around to replaying this for the other path when the enhanced version super patch.

Will play this. Also got new pc parts recently, so gonna eyegasm for sure.
 
Now this [CD Projekt Red] is a developer, people. Updating there game for the better over 2 years later, with a new installment on the horizon.

Yeah, I gotta say I am really blown away by the robust level of support that these guys have shown for their product.

Speaks very highly of the developer's commitment to making the best product they can.

They have my acclaim and my thanks.
 
You know, I never got around to replaying this for the other path when the enhanced version super patch.

Will play this. Also got new pc parts recently, so gonna eyegasm for sure.

Damn so you haven't played since the original version of TW2 launched? There are some pretty huge changes since it released, it's a completely different game IMO
 

Savitar

Member
Continuing to update and enhance a game like that and not find a way to charge for it......more studios could learn a lesson from this.
 
Any chance this'll come to the 360 version in a patch or something?

EDIT: I have the game on PC too. It'd just be nice to be able to finish my third playthrough with these updates.
 

Dylan

Member
This is great timing, because I installed W2 on steam but I stopped playing after the first couple chapters. Any idea if this mod will change the system specs?
 
I´ve bought both games just because stuff like this that makes the developer worth of supporting.

Finished the first game, dropped the second one 10hours in, gotta make some time to complete it.
 

Lingitiz

Member
Any chance this'll come to the 360 version in a patch or something?

EDIT: I have the game on PC too. It'd just be nice to be able to finish my third playthrough with these updates.

Doubt they'd pay that patch fee for something like this.
 

EatChildren

Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
Cool...but I just want the damn grass fixed!
 
Continuing to update and enhance a game like that and not find a way to charge for it......more studios could learn a lesson from this.

More studios SHOULD learn a lesson from this. CDPR have huge respect in gaming circles and this is why. They make few products but make sure they're as good as can be instead of trying to pump out as many as they can
 

RoboPlato

I'd be in the dick
I wonder if they're gearing up for a next gen console rerelease with this. Seems like a lot of effort if they're not doing something else major with it.
 
Hmm, I've yet to play the game (my current laptop can't run it), but when I start it I wonder if I should just play it like it is or use this mod.
 
Now this [CD Projekt Red] is a developer, people. Updating their game for the better over 2 years later, with a new installment on the horizon.

Eh, this is just them employing a modder who continues to mod. Now, RedKit, that's what I call support.
 

Not Spaceghost

Spaceghost
I´ve bought both games just because stuff like this that makes the developer worth of supporting.

Finished the first game, dropped the second one 10hours in, gotta make some time to complete it.

Man you just gotta finish it! And then play through it again picking all different choices, seriously the middle portion of the game feels like a totally different experience if you pick enough options differently.

Though to be honest I loved TW1 way more than TW2, it was a way more flawed game from a gameplay stand point but there was a certain charm to it that is just so rare among WRPG's.
 

Perkel

Banned
Along with all the info released for TW3 the gameplay designer for the series said he is making a mod that changes some stuff for the combat in TW2. Most notably are animation changes which were a big gripe for me personally, also interesting are the effects like enemies exploding after killing them with Igni.



So one could assume they learned a few things making TW3 and want to implement them into TW2 slightly. Which all sounds awesome. It never ceases to amaze me just how much they continue to support their games with free stuff, though of course it's a mod and not a patch being put into the game across all versions so don't wait for TW2 to update or anything

Source

Holy shit those are all gripes i had with TW2 combat model and animations...


FUCKING AMAZING
 

Sentenza

Member
Damn, I just played a full run on Dark Mode one month ago.

Well, I guess this is going to give me some incentive to explore additional content even on Roche's path.
 

DietRob

i've been begging for over 5 years.
YIIIIIIIIIISSSSSSSSSSSS!!

True story I quit playing it because of combat. CD Project is awesome all around.
 
With all the support they give I feel like I cheated them by waiting for steam sales on the special editions of both TW1 and TW2.

I have a feeling I'm going to be picking up The Witcher 3 on PS4 day 1.
 

Easy_D

never left the stone age
Great, never finished it and couldn't find a reason to continue from the start after a harddrive crash (I was in Act 3 I believe) so this is great!
 

RiverBed

Banned
CDP has become one of my favorite devs/publishers this gen and they are definitely on my top list for next gen. I can really feel the passion when playing their great games. :)
 

Bazza

Member
Fucking love these guy's, my fav developers. They may not turn out games at the speed of others but what they do produce is quality and is supported long after release. They are like the PC developers of old, doing what they can to please the customer rather unlike the majority who squeeze as much out of us as possible doing as little as possible.
 
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