Swing Manipulation

Overview

This will cover the fundamentals to apply basic learning theory, purpose, and a means to identify manipulations.

Swing manipulation is moving an attack Tracer.

Using multiple inputs

Hold	Move	Tap
Crouch, Sprint, Movement keys (w,a,s,d)	Mouse/camera movement	Jump (spacebar), Strike/stab keys, Parry into attack (riposte)

Tracers are a surviving mark, sign, or evidence of the former existence shown with lines coming from the source of an attack.

Tracers are similar to when you draw a shape on paper. The pencil draws a path leaving marks that remain after showing where it has been.

These lines can come from body parts or held weapons.

Held melee weapon example

Kick example

Punch example

The tracer lines start drawing when an attack enters the release attack phase. Attacks are only damaging at the soonest point being drawn from the source. Overlapping them after that counts as a miss. Tracers are not shown by default.

Each weapon has a certain amount of time that it is active or able to damage another player, known as the release phase.

Moving a tracer changes where this release phase happens.

You can use inputs before a swing starts or during a swing to move where a tracer happens.

3 Things inputs move

Starting position of tracer	Soonest position being drawn of tracer	End position of tracer

3 Things changing tracer position does

Changes timing of arrival to a target	Changes distance to a target	Changes the angle it is traveling toward

Different distances between the attack and where enemies are hit

Changing the speed that the attack moves or progresses

Changing angle in this case to miss a teammate and then move it back down to hit an enemy.

Being able to change the position of a tracer allows for more control of an attack. This allows you to correct or move a swing to hit a target more often or avoid something you don't want to hit, such as a teammate.

Full Definition

The change in position of an attack tracer. That uses multiple inputs that you can either hold, move or tap; before or during, moving the whole player, limbs, and weapon. That changes the starting position, the soonest position drawn, and the endpoint of the attack to change the timing of arrival, distance to a target, and angle of the real-time progression helping control an attack to hit or miss more often.

Manipulation precursors

Purpose

Moving a tracer to get a desired result.

The most common general purpose of swing manipulation is to help you hit the things you want to be hit and avoid the things you don't. Many videos seen online about swing manipulation often focus on helping guide an attack to evade another player's parry window.

There are many things to account for when modifying a strike or stab. First, you have to define the purpose of the manipulation. A singular action can be multipurpose though its effectiveness can vary in achieving a proportional result from a similar purpose action.

For example, you can strike from the left and right sides. If the purpose is to damage another player, both achieve the same result. Depending on the situation, one of those options may not be possible, making the other more effective.

No matter how abstract the game mechanics, when compared, can serve a similar purpose. When comparing different types of manipulation, note that this comes into play.

Self-observation

What are the things that influence your playstyle? How do you process different influences? Without self-reflecting and implementing constant change, you will always be limited when taking on a new obstacle. Sheer determination in hours played means a lot less when compared to another player that has mastered a way to adapt and implement. Understand what you can and cannot change, implement strategies to adapt to mitigate disadvantages.

Swing corrections

There is a huge amount of variability in attacks. You can not correct an attack if you do not know the angle and direction it is moving.

To list a few

• Positioning
• Timings
• Patterns
• Environmental factors
• Player encounter count
• Different weapons

Actions have a chance to not line up with their intended purpose. You can utilize manipulation to make the outcome more consistent by adding corrections to respond to constantly changing variables. Correcting swings can increase the number of possibilities to hit, miss, or otherwise. (Add a part about how you can manipulate swings for a 2nd chance to hit)

The 3 main things you're adjusting

1. Spacing (the distance between 2 points)
2. Timing (the time that 2 points make contact)
3. Angle (the current and future trajectory)

Swing corrections will apply differently based on gamemode and player count.

1v1

Target switching does not apply.

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1vx

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xvx

Intentional misses help you correct a swing around a teammate so fights are less isolated.

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Intentional misses

There will be many scenarios where you will have to maneuver attacks around an obstacle. With the implementation of the miss detector mechanic, there is a chance for an opponent to recovery their parry nearly instant.

Common uses of intentional misses

• Missing (fake attacking) into a combo
• Missing (fake attacking) to open another players defense in a xv1
• Skipping over another players parry in 1vx or xvx
• Attacking around or over teammates to limit opponents player isolation
• Baiting
• Moving attacks over or around objects

Practice

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Attack direction

Attack Direction is the choice of the starting position of a tracer and the angle an attack will be moving from the starting position within a choose-able angle range. Click here to read more -> Attack Direction

Starting points

Whenever you attack, there is an initial position relative to your opponents. The starting position of your camera, body, and crosshair can determine if a manipulation will be effective. If you're facing an opponent with their back turned, they're limiting known possibilities to counter your approach.

• Good camera positioning heightens your awareness.
• Good body positioning increases response timings.
• Good crosshair positioning increases response timings and consistency.
  

Tracer Patterns

Are the shape you make between the start and end of a tracer. Click here to read more -> Tracer Patterns

Resetting your view

Resetting your view is all about consistency in your starting points. To modify something, it is a best practice to have a baseline. Without a baseline, you won't have the means to conclude that the result of the manipulation won't be a false positive. A practice suggested to new players is to re-center their crosshair on the opponent's heads after every attack. On top of the benefit of retaining your opponent in line of sight, it provides a way to respond defensively to normalized spacing and movements.

Practice testing map and skill isolation

One of the main ways to theory craft and refine your muscle memory is to join a clan or group of players. Many movements are entirely conditional. Scenario building can not be practiced effectively in many cases due to variability in factors such as social connections, skill, setup time, hardware, connection latency, reaction time, map-specific elements, skill mixing, scale, distance, and more. Bots are great for quick reset times, more consistent loops, ease of scale, and they don't get bored after doing the same thing endlessly. Players are great at providing a way to iterate testing at an increased pace, adapting, providing criticism from a different perspective, and showing you a difference in reactions. There is no way to simulate an entire past fight; the moment you do something different, it strays from the source. Many players don't understand how to isolate inputs to test individual mechanics. There is a large amount of overlap using different inputs for similar actions. For example, you don't need to press s to walk backward. Alternating footwork by moving left and right while moving your mouse is another way to do so. A player not knowing how to isolate inputs causes false positives, making it unreliable. (missing info adding more later)

You can access a testing map to isolate basic movement and swing manipulation with a player controlled bot. Click here to read more -> Combat Test Level

Conditional Moves

Some actions have a set of dependencies to be performed. When first learning manipulations, it's easy to fall into the trap of never taking action without conditions meeting those dependencies. The more you rely on conditional moves, the easier it is for your opponent to identify patterns.

Examples of conditional moves

• Baiting
• Combos
• Ripostes
• Dodges
• Matrixing
• Ducking
• Jumping
• Chambers

Riposte feeding

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Memorizing timings

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The spreadsheet meme

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Windup, release and recovery are measured in time

Mordhau has time-based strategy elements. Good decision-making is a more consistent strategy than relying on pure manipulation. Improvement made in lowering the amount of hit trading; gives the impression of a turn-based strategy game. That is only one part overall. The combat is continuous and real-time. Managing response decisively and formulating future decisions; is needed in adapting to different play styles. There are in-between states, often requiring different levels of commitment at different phases. These phases allow you to apply manipulation for different durations, allowing corrections when no longer reaching their intended purpose. Many players take advantage of this to remain able to respond.

Click here to read more -> Attack Phases

Muscle Memory

Many players, when they first start learning, are taught by repetition. Often, told to "feel it out" to understand. Performing actions without understanding the underlying mechanics leads to applying them ineffectively, which is hard to undo. First, learning and understanding fundamentals will help instinctively lessen the amount of counterproductive repetition when building muscle memory.

Don't trust grunt timings

There is an audible grunt to signify when an attack has passed the time frame to cancel it or to perform another action. Don't trust them unless it's the only way for you to know when to defend (For example, your back is turned to your opponent)

Grunts are good for identifying these few things

1. When an attack has entered release phase
2. Spatial awareness
3. When a player could start to lunge forward

Grunts may be coded to have a fixed timing but there are many mechanical and software components that make audio unreliable for exact measurement. Even if audio could be 100% precise too much variance is created by the factors listed in swing corrections.

Behind the screen

There are many things you can do to raise your consistency interfacing with the game. Regardless of what device or control scheme you use.

To list a few

• Posture
• Neutral positioning in physical space with devices that move frequently.
• Using the same devices every time.
• Improving ergonomics in your setup so your resting position doesn't need to change because of discomfort.

Weapons have a base speed and turn caps

After you press to start an attack there is a continuous rate of movement to the weapon. It is theoretically possible to match the continuous rate in the opposite direction to make a weapon seemingly stand still with but not exclusive to mouse manipulation. In practice there are far too many variables to make this perfectly consistent. The concept of manipulating this base speed is called dragging and accelerating which is covered here. It should be noted that dragging and accelerating are not manipulations themselves but the end result of ones being used. (go more in depth and really define what a drag and accel are. then point out their differences and how they're applied) The rate at which you can manipulate the base speed is determined by the turn cap. (add a more in depth definition of what a turn cap is also how the values are applied)

Whenever you move your mouse out of a neutral position you lessen the potential travel distance in the projected path of the surface it's gliding on to an environmental obstruction or to the end point of physical reach. Conversely, by extending projected movement to an extreme value along the end point of reach it creates more potential in the opposite direction while lessening it in the current path. While this observation may be appealing to exploit it causes a defensive weakness in your starting points and it encourages your opponent to safely strafe around you. By returning your mouse to a neutral position after every swing you limit these potential downsides.

The weapon's turn cap is the rate you can resist, influence and control the progression of an attack by controlling look direction of the player's character with a mouse or joystick. Resisting progression of an attack pulls it back, brings it closer to the start, and delays it. Following through with progression of an attack pushes it forward, brings it to an ending earlier, and accelerates it.

There are ways to return the mouse to a neutral position.

1. Sliding it back - The downside here is a small but noticeable pattern making your inputs more predictable.
2. Picking it up - The downside here is a small but noticeable delay in reaction time with this method.

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Different weapon stats

Choosing different weapons will have tradeoffs. You can see weapon statistics. Click here to read more -> Weapons

Brief important factors in weapon statistics that change player behavior in applying swing manipulation.

• Length - how close or far your encounters need to be.
• Damage - the risk factor to an approach.
• Miss cost - frequency and accuracy of the follow-through of attacks.
• Stamina drain and parry drain negation - if they will strategize disarms over manipulation or baiting for recovery.
• Stop on hit - increases the need for mix ups, intentional misses, combos, and remembering recovery timings in a 1vx.
• Knockback - changes the amount of spatial awareness needed to engage in a fight and the amount of footwork required to maintain manipulation effectiveness.
• Windup - the longer your windup is the more you have to predict things instead of just reacting to them.
• Combo - changes the approach to an engagement and how likely you may choose stamina drain over recovery.
• Release - the amount of time after windup that your damage value is active. (slightly change this to better convey how it changes player behavior)
• Recovery - the amount of time you can't perform other actions like parrying or attacking again after you fully commit. (slightly change this to better convey how it changes player behavior)
• Alt mode - can be used to fulfill a specific use case by removing restrictions that were applied to the primary mode or by environmental factors.

Note that there are many other features that can impact gameplay with manipulation.

• Weapon stance can change the weapons max extension and starting point regardless of length not of the weapon but of the reach.
• Arm space distance is the empty space behind the blue tracers showing where the handle is. This has a huge impact on timing, reach and accuracy of attacks.
• Lunges a description of lunges can be found here.
• Head positioning with different weapons slightly changes fov
• Alt grip changing your dominant foot on some weapons (aka the shuffle)

Body reading Manipulations

Is observing character models to obtain suggestive and sometimes absolute insight in to what your opponent may do next. Click here to read more -> Body reading

Telegraphing

Is unintentionally making known what your intentions or next moves are; to an opponent. It's commonly connected with movements used too early or before they are in a position to become effective.

When fighting an opponent, you want your next move to be as unclear or unpredictable as possible. You can do this by disguising your move as something else, canceling it, and limiting how many patterns are in your movements.

Body feinting is using the movement of your player model to simulate the motion of an attack or fake telegraphing, usually to control or scare another player into doing something such as panic parrying. Movements that become too dissimilar to the attack make it easier to predict or clear for your opponent. Camera movement beyond what is possible during an attack or turn-capped makes it clear.

Common telegraphing types

• Overextending mouse manipulation
• Prematurely adjusting body orientation
• Sprint tapping
• Lunging
• Repetitive and impulsive inputs
  

Neutral swing manipulation is the lack of input while looking directly at an opponent after starting an attack until your weapon enters its release phase. Typically, used to reduce telegraphing until the last possible moment and attempt to make mixups more effective.

riposte vs non-riposte

Neutral or non-riposte attacks start without parring first.

Attacks are considered a riposte if they are started soon after parrying an incoming attack.

Both types have different acceleration or progression curves from the start to the end of the release phase.

Face hugging

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Countering manipulations with footwork

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Matching footwork

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Moving away from the attack direction

Moving away from the direction of an attack often increases the spacing between you and a damaging tracer. Having increased space allows you more time to respond, body read with greater view to more parts and more time for an input to arrive at the server you're playing on. This is often far more important than swing manipulation itself.

Common swing manipulation types

Remember, all manipulations can change the timing of arrival, distance to a target, and angle, in different ways.

Body orientation/look direction before a swing

What it is	Default Input	Additional notes
Is the change in the starting position of an attack tracer to a target using look direction before the attack starts not impacted by turn caps. Focused on moving only the starting position and endpoint.	move mouse before an attack	Identifying this type of manipulation requires body reading and understanding limitations in starting point positioning. This type of manipulation is most commonly used in combination with mouse manipulation. The key difference is that body orientation manipulation is setup before your movements are influenced by the turn cap.

The time it can be applied

Before the swing yes

Into windup no

During windup no

Into release no

During release no

Swing Manipulations

Type	What it is	Default Input	Additional notes
Body orientation	Is the change in the starting position of an attack tracer to a target using look direction before the attack starts not impacted by turn caps.	move mouse before an attack	Identifying this type of manipulation requires body reading and understanding limitations in starting point positioning. This type of manipulation is most commonly used in combination with mouse manipulation. The key difference is that body orientation manipulation is setup before your movements are influenced by the turn cap.
Time it can be applied	Before the swing yes	Into windup no	During windup no	Into release no	During release no
Mouse movement	Is the change in the soonest position being drawn of an attack tracer to a target using look direction during an attack impacted by turn caps.	move mouse during an attack	Many players suggest not using this type during wind up unless it's intentionally used to body feint.
Time it can be applied	Before the swing no	Into windup no	During windup yes	Into release yes	During release yes
Footwork moving whole player	Is the change in the position of the whole player to a target using movement keys before or during an attack limited by movement speed.	use w, a, s and d to move in all directions
Time it can be applied	Before the swing yes	Into windup yes	During windup yes	Into release yes	During release yes
Footwork moving arms	Is the sway motion to the arms caused by the whole body moving, changing the position of the player's arms to a target using movement keys during an attack.	use w, a, s and d to move in all directions	The weapon has a form of persistence and a rate of travel in a certain direction. This persistence used to be static and fixed to the movement of the body. Weapons now have a form of membership to the body that is influenced but not fixed to the body as a whole. One way to observe this happening is to first swing standing still while watching the distance between the weapon and your crosshair. Then repeat the process while moving. In some cases you can direct a swing by aiming with your footwork input to make them more likely to reach since it is independent from the turn cap.
Time it can be applied	Before the swing no	Into windup yes	During windup yes	Into release yes	During release yes
Jumping		press spacebar
Time it can be applied	Before the swing yes	Into windup yes	During windup yes	Into release yes	During release no
Crouching		press or hold control	Lessens footwork manipulations.
Time it can be applied	Before the swing yes	Into windup yes	During windup yes	Into release yes	During release yes
Lunges		strike with left mouse button or stab with middle scroll, w and shift	Lunges are a fixed speed and length. The variance in range is created by the increased amount of wind up in larger weapons. You can see when the velocity changes are initiated by using the command m.showpawndebug 1. Lunges do not require you to hold w through the whole process. Using shift to sprint with a lunge is not required to start one but recommend. Having an increased amount of time in windup can make target switching easier without having to cancel your attack to retain closeness.
Time it can be applied	Before the swing no	Into windup no	During windup no	Into release yes	During release no
Ripostes		parry with right mouse button then start a strike with the left mouse button or stab with middle scroll
Time it can be applied	Before the swing no	Into windup yes	During windup no	Into release no	During release no