I begin with what I like about the combat system:
The skill involved with timing and aiming attacks, not just face-mashing buttons. This adds to the skill cap of the combat system of the game, which i feel is superb, really.
With a solid foundation, I just continued to add a couple of my thoughts. As I think of more I will edit this post.
Combat Damage Revamp:
Damage Types:
Pierce:
Medium Blood Damage, Low Phlegm Damage
Special Debuff: Muscle Tear
Debuff Effect: Any Actions Costs increased Phlegm, each instance of this debuff stacks to increase phlegm cost for each action
Slash:
High Blood Damage
Special Debuff: Bleed (pretty much same as you get from bears or cougars)
Debuff Effect: Blood DOT, each instance stacks to increase Blood DOT
Smash:
Medium Blood Damage, Mini-Stun on successful Hit
Special Debuff: Fracture (pretty much same as you get from bears and deers, except....)
Debuff Effect: Decreases maximum Yellow Bile, A small percent chance to experience a second instance advancing into a compound fracture, a compound fracture slows all movements down significantly.
Counter:
Blocks Attack, Low Black Bile Damage
Special Debuff: Fear (pretty much same as you experience from bears)
Debuff Effect: Black Bile DOT, stacks for each instance, increasing Black Bile DOT
Combat System Revamp:
Weapons:
Each Weapon will have a primary and secondary combat damage type. Primary damage type has X% chance to trigger corresponding special debuff, and secondary damage type has 1/4*X% chance to trigger corresponding special debuff.
Skills:
Each skill has a primary damage type, this adds 1/4X% chance to trigger corresponding special debuff.
Artifacts:
4 different gems will each boos a different damage/defence type, and increase chance to afflict special debuff or gain resistance to special debuff.
Overall:
All offensive and defensive bonuses stack, but with diminishing returns (possibly scaling logarithmically). This lets us play with specialization and maximizing and minimizing stats at various costs.
Weapons:
Fists:
Primary Damage type: Smash
Secondary Damage Type: Counter
Clubs:
I am pretty sure Metal Clubs or flails were around before swords or at least at the same time as swords, enough said.
Guns:
(**NOTE** I have not personally used guns yet, so this is a stab in the dark)
Because olden day guns and bullets were finicky at best, however there still existed skilled marksmen who could shoot amazingly accurately….
Bullet has Y amount chance to travel straight towards your cursor for X amount of pixels, then veers off course (random trajectory within a cone) for remainder of flight time. X and Y scales logarithmically off your Cloak & Dagger proficiency level.
This concept can be expanded to all ranged weapons, with each weapons having a certain multiplier/divider that affects the "accurate" distance.
New Skills:
Play Dead:
Cost: low Yellow Bile, medium Black BIle
Animation: same as getting knocked out
Effect: Has a chance to de-agro animals, usable in pvp to trick/launch counter attack.
Reason: Because it sounds fun.
So far, that is it, now....
...my ass is ready, bring on the toxicity.