Fighting

Main / Skills / Fighting

Description

Skill used in melee fighting animals and players.

Targeting

Fighting in Wurm uses a target-to-attack system.

To enter combat, right-click the entity, and select Attacks > Target. Then, move within fighting range. There are 3 distances:

• Melee - move right up against the target
• Throwing - 1 to 5 tiles from the target
• Archery - up to 20 tiles depending on the bow
  • Short Bows are best shot from 5 tiles away
  • Reflex bows are best shot from 10 tiles away
  • Long Bows are best shot from 20 tiles away

To stop targeting, right-click any object and select No target.

Multiple targets

The target is generally the sole focus of the player's offensive capabilities, whereas the player will attempt to defend all incoming attacks whether the aggressor is targeted or not. Normally, if a player has no target selected, any aggression from creatures is met with automatic targeting and retaliation. However, if a player targets one creature afar and is attacked by another, this is not the case - the target will not change. This introduces the possibility that the player will accidentally just stand there doing no attacks. The player will also not be able to change his aim or shield bash in this circumstance.

Be aware of what is targeted

• Note: You show off some moves means you have no target or the target is out of melee range.

Skills

The height of the main fighting skill helps determine your Combat rating, henceforth CR. Skill is generally only gained on the death of an opponent.

The best way to train fight skill is by fighting opponents that are near your CR. That way, the skill you gain will be far superior than training against a creature that is either too strong for you or simply a very easy match. Greenish, raging, angry, and CHAMPION creatures are a very effective way to train fighting.

Fighting skill gain against non-player creatures is slowed down at 70 skill.

Fighting sub-skills

• Weaponless fighting - Fighting without weapons equipped (depends on weight of items being carried and type of armor); skill is gained when a kick or hit message is received.
• Aggressive fighting - Reduced defense, but increased offense. Damage is enhanced. Two-handed weapons swing faster.
• Defensive fighting - Reduced offense, but increased defense. Moving CR penalties are reduced. Parry and dodge rate is increased.
• Normal Fighting - Defenses and offenses are weapons' defaults, scaled with skills and body stats.
• Taunting - Attempting to taunt your opponent to attack you instead of your allies.
• Shield bashing - Knocking over your opponent with your shield. Higher skill in shield bash results in a longer time the opponent is disabled on ground. A combination of shield skill and shield bash skill calculate hit chance. Shield-bashing does some damage to the opponent. This results in a stun. Beware that this might take the attention of the enemy to the person doing the shield bashing.

Weapon skills

Weapon skill affects the following:

• Damage dealt
• Swing timer
• Stance availability and/or chance
• Chance to parry
• Special moves available

Swing timer is decreased by 1% for every 10 skill levels. Weapon QL also affects everything listed except swing timer and chance to parry.

An easy way to gain weapon skill with axes and swords (longsword and huge sword, respectively) is to cut trees down with woodcutting until 20 skill. This renders even the lowest skill fighter a fairly potent adversary to most common creatures in the Wurm universe, and offers some good body and woodcutting skill gain to boot.

Focus

Main / Skills / Fighting / Fighting

Raising your focus increases your performance in combat. How high you can focus is dependent on your fight skill. A general rule of thumb dictates that overall fightskill/15 determines the level of focus that is easiest for you to reach.

You can attempt to focus by turning off autofight and clicking on the eye icon in the fight window.

The fight Options GUI

There are six possible states of focus:

1. You are not focused on combat.
2. You balance your feet and your soul.
3. You are now focused on the enemy and its every move.
4. You feel lightning inside, quickening your reflexes.
5. Your consciousness is lifted to a higher level, making you very attentive.
6. You feel supernatural. Invincible! (max focus level)

Notes

• You can check your current focus level by typing the /fl command in the chat window or by hovering over the eye icon.
• It is believed that focus raises your combat rating by a little bit.
• Focus helps you parry more with your weapon.
• Focus helps you hit more.
• Focus helps you get a better footing.
• In PvE, focus can turn a fight around completely.
• Whilst the focus action timer is in progress, you are a lot more open to attack and you do not swing your own weapon(s).
• There are various ways to lose focus, including switching targets, and through a special move.

Stances

While in combat, the player has the option to shift the focus of his blows to different parts of the opponent's body using 'stances'. Blows to different parts of the body may have different effects. For example, aiming for the head of the opponent yields significantly more damage as well as a temporary decrease in Mind logic. Aiming for the feet or legs may also slow your opponent, etc.

Aiming at different body parts also affects your chances of aiming at others. For example, if you aim for the right parts, then the chances of aiming for the lower right or upper right parts will normally increase. Most special moves may also only be performed when aiming at certain body parts.

In addition to changing offensive aim, there are also defensive stances. The player cannot have an offensive and defensive stance selected at the same time; he must choose one or the other. Defensive stances are the last of the bunch to become available to the player - usually around 48-50 weapon skill.

While in autofight (button in the event window), the game will choose stances for you. However, at low skills, no stance options will be available to you. More stances will appear with a higher primary weapon skill.

You can bind stances to keys - see Client Key Bindings.

Special moves

As your skill increases with your primary weapon, you will get the option to perform special moves in certain stances. One weapon type usually can perform about 6 special moves, most of which involve stunning the opponent or draining his stamina.

Special moves are kingdom dependent, so other kingdoms have other moves.

Autofighting will try special moves when you have a high enough chance to use them. They use your normal to hit chance, so if you hit little it may not be worth trying a special move. You lose 1/10th of the stamina cost of the move if you fail.

You can bind special moves to keys, see Client Key Bindings.

Also see: Special moves

Equipment

Weapons

• Primary weapon should be equipped in the right hand, as the left hand will attack less often. Left hand also does not parry at all.

• Swords deal cutting and piercing damage. Swords have a high parry rate and do medium damage.
• Axes deal cutting damage. Axes rarely parry, but deal the highest amount of base damage.
• Mauls deal maul damage. Mauls have a medium parry rate and do medium-high damage.

Armour types

Each armor type has a distinct advantage and disadvantage.

• Plate armour - Plate armour provides the largest defense bonus of any armour crafted from non-unique components, at the largest expense of mobility. Steel plate armour specifically has a high damage reduction factor equal to that of drake hide armour. Iron plate is slightly less than this.
• Chain armour - Chain armour provides good defense with a medium penalty to mobility. Evasion is moderately affected by chain armor. Chain armour is commonly used. Chain reduces a fair bit of damage.
• Leather armour - Leather armour provides light defenses with medium-high mobility. Walking speed and evasion penalties are minimal.
• Studded leather armour - Studded leather armour provides a moderate amount of base defense with similar penalties as leather armour. Studded leather armour represents a good common ground between speed and defense. Studded leather armour has a mild evasion penalty. Studded leather is very popular, as its mix of moderate mitigation and good mobility make it perfect for archers and light fighters in PvP.
• Cloth armour - Offers minimal protection with high mobility. Cloth armour has the highest evasion rate of any armor type and can be used as an emergency bandage to great effect in dire situations.

Special armour types

• Drake hide armour - The best leatherworking based armour existing in Wurm. Made from the hide of dragon hatchlings, its protection rating is similar to plate. Drake hide armor has a small penalty to walking speed and is very lightweight.
• Dragon scale armour - Dragon scale is the best armour available. Made out of the scales of a dragon (any color), this plate armour smithing based armour suffers only a very small movement penalty. However, this armour damages faster than any other in combat.

Shields

Shields have a percentage chance to block any melee attack, based on skill-level and class of shield. Additionally shields are effective against arrows when you are facing the archer. Wielding a shield and weapon on the left arm causes the weapon not to be used. Certain weapons are two-handed and will require that any shield be unequipped. There is no difference between wielding a wooden or metal shield. Shields used to affect swing timers, but this is no longer the case.

• Large shield - Greatest base percentage to block.
• Small shield - Lower base percentage to block, but much lighter.
• Medium shield - Middle ground between large and small.

Shields should be equipped on your arm, not your hand.

Fighting characteristics

• Body control - Helps with accuracy, dodging, and stealthing. Archery, Shields, leatherworking, smithing, tailoring, carpentry and subskills of these such as fletching offer good skill gains. Some weapon skills also offer Body Control gains.
• Mind speed - The effects of this skill in combat are not well documented. Supposedly affects the chance to land a special move or perhaps change stance.
• Body strength - Helps with damage per hit, and for taking less damage when hit. Good methods to gain Body Strength include mining, smithing, digging, woodcutting, farming, butchering, and masonry masonry, and their subskills. Papyrusmaking, coal-making, and some weapon skills also increase Body Strength.
• Body stamina - Determines how long you can fight before running out of stamina. When you run out of stamina, you can not move or defend yourself against incoming attacks very well. Raised by woodcutting, milling, digging, and mining. However, on freedom it is raised by woodcutting, Milling, digging, and mining.

Miscellaneous fighting rules/tips

• If you get hit, you can start "hurting". That means you move slower (30s duration).
• Bigger numbers matter. Gang up on people. Also, if multiple people start to attack you, its best to try to get some of them off you unless you severely outclass them.
• There is a flanking bonus to hit from the side or back. If you're outnumbered, face your strongest opponent. If you outnumber them, surround them. Especially animals, as they turn constantly when surrounded.
• Moving while fighting gives a penalty to the hit odds of the moving person, and a big penalty to the parry odds. This is reduced by using defensive fighting.
• Use 'Spam Mode' to show missed blows, parries, and blows for zero damage.
• Standing above a critter improves hit chance and reduces the capacity of that critter to target your upper components. Riding a mount provides a similar effect. Standing beneath one reverses this effect.
• Running out of stamina during a fight reduces your capacity to defend incoming damage and will often make escape impossible.
• Take a look at the combat rating page for some tips on fighting.

Ranged attacks

For details on ranged attacks, see archery and catapults.

• Throwing

Damage messages and Strength of attacks

When you encounter an opponent, be it a Venerable Greenish Scorpion or just a young starving dog, a successful strike will give you the following message:

You <Type of Damage> adolescent starving wolf <Strength of your Blow> and <Result> it.

The Type of Damage is the kind of damage dealt by the currently equipped weapon, For example: piercing or mauling.

The Strength of your Blow is how hard the hit itself is. The scale is:

1. Very Lightly

2. Lightly

3. Pretty Hard

4. Hard

5. Very Hard

6. Extremely Hard

7. Deadly Hard

The Result is the severity of the resulting wound. The scale is: slaps, irritates, hurts, harms, damages. Basically the Result is there to tell you what the attack you just made really did to the enemy.

Guides

• PvP (Combat)

Titles

• Soldier at 50 skill
• Mercenary at 70 skill
• Knight/Amazon at 90 skill