作者：Eben Bradstreet, John Clements

Eben Bradstreet谈逼真的战斗

第一次去John Clements的Iron Door工作室时，我学会了如何握长剑。

一开始我认为很简单：双手握住剑柄就可以了。那就是我想象中的拿剑方式。毕竟电影中也是这样么演的。长剑的剑柄是圆头和十字之间的部分，长度足够让双手握上。所以我把手放在那里，对吧？

错。在大多数情况下，右手（主手）应该放在十字的后面，左手应该抓住圆头—-剑柄末端突出的球形物。

一开始我有些纳闷：“把手放在那里，真的？我以为圆头是拿来砸头骨的或保持平衡的。要么就是装饰。”

在观看电影《天朝王国》中的某一幕时，我的注意力转到主演Orlando Bloom身上。显然，他是以看起来最和谐的方式拿武器的：双手握剑柄。到电影后期，他甚至用圆头（他没有用手抓圆头）砸某人，这使我更加坚定了我的猜想。

长剑的错误握法和正确握法

圆头在现实世界中的作用比较复杂一点。它确实可用于敲敌人，也确实影响剑的平衡，有时候甚至也挺好看的。但是，它就是握武器的地方。当我第一次研究真正的武器时，长剑的握法有力地挑战了我的所有假设。

根植于现实的幻想

长剑握法的例子也让我想到，现实对动画师意味着什么。如果电子游戏角色用辅助手抓住圆头，那么动画中出现的手腕变形问题将更少，剑的网格和角色的网格也更少相切，当角色挥剑时，生物机械效果将会显得更好。

前面两点被微妙地改进了，这最明显地体现在双手握剑柄，把剑伸出来，然后是把武器放在相当于眼睛的高度。从这个位置开始，开始用武器转向、旋转和削砍，同时保持武器在你的前方。如果你手上没有这种剑，你可以用木棒或塑料板模拟一下这套动作。为了模拟露出的圆头，请把手放在木棒末端约三到五英寸的地方。

当你旋转剑时，注意圆头是否经常碰到你的手腕，特别是当你想把剑刃挥到右下方时，另外在某些时候，你无法继续旋转剑，因为你的手腕不能扭曲到完成这个动作的程度。

正如我所说的，这是微妙的时刻。当你用正确的握法—-右手握剑柄，左手抓圆头时，奇迹发生了。首先，你会发现你的手变得灵活多了。这时候的手和剑形成一种杆杠关系，剑是杠杆，而你的主腕是支点，所以你抓住支点的远端，就能更好地控制剑刃。你还应该注意到，圆头可以在你的手掌中自由滑动和转向。你的手腕现在可以应付大部分旋转动作，不再有圆头网格插入角色的手腕网格的危险了。

糟糕的剑，糟糕参考，糟糕的动画

不可避免地，你会想捕捉一些参考动作。即使你使用的是动作捕捉技术，亲身“感受”一下动作，或者拿出相机拍一些动态总是好的。

寻找参考的最糟糕的做法就是使用糟糕的剑，无论你决定如何握剑。对于大部分人而言，要获得一把一般的剑，最简单的办法就是去跳蚤市场或精品店或网购。通过这些渠道获得的动画道具，基本上是很糟糕的，极少例外。它们要么太重，要么平衡性不好。

在我的工作室，我有一把这样的剑，甚至在挥舞了两年的钢管作为武术道具，我仍然不知道拿它怎么办。重量太重，所有企图减少重量影响的努力都会直接扭曲角色的动作。正是这种笨拙的道具使我们的角色显得迟钝。所以，我们决定不使用它。

与其碰运气使用可能破坏动画的武器，不如直接去五金店买一把木销钉或一段PVC管。如果你的手够巧，还可以自己做一把木剑。木质道具当然比钢管轻得多，但更容易做出漂亮的挥舞动作（对导演、动画师和演员来说都有好处）。另一个办法是使用廉价的仿冒品（这是最理想的）。糟糕的道具会使你的工作更难进行。

在第一张图中，John和我使用的剑是Albion Swords（www.albion-swords.com）制作的。制作这些武器需要的时间比较长，所以也许尽快收集廉价的道具才是理想的办法。

通用生物力学

随着我更加了解长剑战斗的艺术，正如中世纪和文艺复兴时的欧洲人对它的理解（在许多文献中有记载），我开始觉得这整套技能其实是非常直观的。有一些基本的守势，大约有9个攻击方向，和几条指导步法的规则。更高级的招式虽然看起来震撼，但基本上是辅助的：在我看过的所有对打练习中，从来没有出现华而不实的招式。事实上，我看得越多，学习得越深入，我就越觉得熟悉。

这种熟悉感不是来源于电影或舞台剧—-当然也不是来自花式击剑这样的运动。我看到的电影中的对打比赛，也就是John的工作室的墙上贴着的历史想象图所反映的，看来起更像我参军时学习的格斗术加电视上的武术比赛。野蛮而粗鲁，与骑士般的华丽或高雅完全没有关系。这就是真实的打斗—-因为无论我们来自什么地方，出生在什么年代，我们都是人类，我们都受到相同的生物力学的制约。

想一下我们刚讨论过的武器。如果是三年前我拿着这把武器，有人让人挥舞它，我的动作可能与其他大多数人一样。也许我会把剑挥舞得像棒球棍，或者因为我小时候砍过柴，我会把剑挥舞得像斧头。如果握武器的人是你，你会怎么做？你可能会模仿你动画片角色或者日本武士的动作。

你不会做的是（至少我们大部分人不会做的是）把剑挥舞得像高尔夫球杆。但为什么不会？二者具有相同的长度，且都能用来打东西，作用范围都在距离末端五英寸的地方。当然，把剑像高尔夫球一样挥舞，可能会对你的目标造成破坏性的效果。那么为什么我们不那样挥剑？

答案是生物力学和感觉。从生物力学上说，那样挥剑的效率并不高：高尔夫球杆的目标高度与地面平齐，而剑的目标高与眼睛水平。因为目标高度的差距太大，我们本能地认为把剑像高尔夫球杆那样挥动是错的。

现在，我们把这个想法再进一步探究一下：想一下你的动画目标，你的角色的敌人的位置。像挥棒球棍一样挥剑有用吗？想一下你可能开发的游戏：当你的角色试图杀死某人时，你的目标更可能是投手（在你面前）而不是球（当你挥剑时，球就在你身边）。站得像个击球员，然后挥剑就好像你要打球，对吗？可能还是不对。

所以现在我们退一步问自己：什么才是最好的做法？没有什么办法比问专家更好了，但即使你没有时间或条件咨询专家，努力研究一下关于武器的生物力学的基本原理，仍然能在很大程度上指导你如何制作战斗动画。

现实中的反向运动

正如我前面所说的，文艺复兴时期的基本剑术和武术是相当简单的，一旦你理解了，剩下的就是练习和实践的问题了。

然而，出于制作动画的目的，基本功却是非常好的起点，可以帮助你设计出战士的独特剪影，且不要求动画师自己就是一名出色的剑士。

一旦你习惯了握剑方式，剑士要学习的另一项基本功就是基本的站姿：我们叫作“守势”。

出于动画的目的，最好把这些站姿当作剑士的停止姿势。

当你开始运用这些姿势时，你会发现，无论你的角色执行什么砍杀招式或面朝什么方向，他们结束招式后总是恢复到停止姿势中的一种。这些姿势彼此之间可以流畅高效地转换，突出剑士的控制和定位能力。

四种基本的守势如下图所示：

四种基本的守势分别是：Phlug、Alber、Vom Tach和Ochs。

你还会发现，这些姿势与反向运动配合得非常好。就像算法驱动操作、武器引导动作、反向运动目标引导动画。你也会注意到，躯干和上肢的活动似乎独立于下肢。另外，当你逐一尝试这些步法，你会发现你的角色可以单脚旋转，向前或向后只是一个中心镜像动画的简单问题。

当然，要看到这些停止姿势的优点，必须有基本的砍杀动作作为情境。我不打算介绍所有停止姿势、过渡和砍杀的完整序列，而是用特定的动作序列来解释我的观点。

如下图所示，我举例的动作是第15种守势，叫作Nebenhut。注意，我的左脚（主导下肢）是弯的，而右脚（辅助下肢）是直的。另外，我的两脚张开呈45度。假设这时我附近出现了一个新敌人，我想转身180度去打他。我不是一边保持Nebenhut，一边笨拙地转身并挥动我的剑，而是先紧紧地握住我的剑。

当我开始转身时，我的头和躯干先转向，接着是我的左脚转到120度时停止。这个动作序列的第三步是把我的重心转移到右脚（现在它是主导），再我把左脚调整成新的姿势。注意，现在我的Nebenhut已经变成Alber了。最后，我举起剑，把守势从Alber变成Phlug。

尽管把我的整个身体朝向新方向，我的右腕（反向运动的假定目标）也从来没有改变位置。另外，直到我最后举起武器，剑几乎仍然没有动过。注意我的转向，我的一个脚跟仍然在同一个位置上（请忽略图中我的位置变化；因为前面有墙挡着，所以我得后退一些）。

即使开始进攻后，身体也总是回归到基本的守势。如下图所示，我们看到John一开始是作出守势Vom Tag，然后前进一步开始打击。接着是迅速旋转武器从相反的角度再次打击。他重复这个快速打击招式若干次，每一次打击的方向都不一样。

尽管每一次打击的方向都改变，John在再次打击前总是恢复Vom Tag。他不这么做是因为为了这个动作本身，他必定已经训练自己执行这个特定的过渡动作；他这么做是因为从生物力学上说，这是从一次打击过渡到下一次打击的最有效方式。这种现象对动画师来说特别有用，因为在打击之间的任何时刻，我们都可能在不迅速做出停止姿势的情况下结束我们的动作序列，这有可能破坏玩家的沉浸感。

来源于现实的夸张

从根本上说，夸张是动画师的工作之一；我们使角色像演员一样在舞台上或摄像机前表演。现实总是被夸张化或改变以迎合生产的需要。但无论你说的是《翡翠帝国》还是《使命召唤》，你总是以现实为基础。对于发生在中世纪或幻想世界的游戏，从正确的源材料（游戏邦注：如文艺复兴时期的剑术）中汲取灵感的刀剑战斗，可以帮助你做出与众不同的打斗动画，使动画工作更容易进行。

John Clements：给现实一个机会

想象一下，如果游戏设计师从来没有见过或听说过真正的亚洲武术，也从没来有做过带有这种元素的游戏。那么有一天，一名日本武道大师或中国武夫大师站出来说：“我认为使用我们的武术作为资源，你可以做一些更逼真的东西。我们灵巧的移动方式是你从来没有见识过的。”我想游戏开发者会很快发现有一些重要且复杂的东西值得好好探索。他们可能不会自负冷漠地回应—-当我提起我研究、教授和练习过的中世纪剑术时，有些开发者却显得不屑一顾。

内行人

在过去30多年，我一直在研究中世纪和文艺复兴时期的近身战术。我研究这个课题，并写了不少论文，甚至为这种技艺制作了世界上唯一的私人装备。我不是专业武师、表演家，也不是搞笑艺人，但却是一名根据真正的武学教授真正的武术的资深武术艺术家。研究这些历史上的武术技艺是我一生的职业和热情所在。

现在，我并不认为制作中世纪或幻想游戏的人必须制作一个百分百准确的战斗模拟器，达到下一款《使命召唤》游戏那种程度的逼真就足够了（第一次战斗时角色死亡，游戏将停止）。

然而，我确实认为，制做这些包含中世纪战斗的游戏的勤劳发开者本可以过得更轻松（和做出甚至更好的游戏），如果他们从更真实的材料中汲取灵感的话。

有趣的是，我们已经知道有人确实这么做了。看看原版的《波斯王子》，制作者Jordan Mechner先拍摄好真人的走路、跳跃和基本的防御动作，然后转换成动画和游戏中的动作。那款游戏标志着游戏制作史上的一大突破，但后来的游戏基本上是复制这些动作后再加以润饰，再后来的游戏又再复制前一款游戏并润饰，如此循环，直到原材料的现实主义基础完全丧失。

利用源材料

这个是常识：如果你正在制作一款现代特种部队游戏，你就要咨询这个行业的权威人士。如果你制作的是拳击游戏，那么你就要咨询职业拳击手。如果你做的是空战游戏，那么你就要咨询空军战士。如果你制作的是关于日本武士的游戏，那么你当然要找武道大师合作。当你复制复本的复本时，你就会离真实的源材料越来越远—-这意味着你正在修改一个接一个的复本所具有的相同润饰和局限性，而没有将你的真实设计和动画对照真正的源材料。

例如，设计师可能观看动作电影并想，“看起来很棒。也许我可以设计一个允许玩家执行那种招式的机制？”但他们所看到的可能性是不合理的；游戏制作者不能评估差劲的动作吗？如果有其他更好的方案怎么办？如果这个“真正的东西”—-自卫的一般原则，或使用特定武器的某些元素，或技术的特殊组合，真的更酷怎么办？如果这名设计师设计动作时没有参考正确的材料，没有理解动作如何执行及为什么那么执行，他们就无法让这个动作与游戏中的战斗相适应，更无法使用对这个动作的理解作为游戏战斗的设计灵感。

这或多或少就是我在游戏的古代近战设计中看到的一般过程。当我指出这一点时，开发者们通常会觉得我在侮辱他们。为什么？除了冒犯设计师的创意能力，还因为我暗示设计游戏的人自己并不熟悉历史上真正的近战是怎么回事。他们并没有用真正的武器以这种方式进行长期训练，也没有用真正的招式命中真正的目标的大量经验，更别说他们并没有经过严格的武器打斗训练的运动员的那种身材。说我冒犯他们，似乎很奇怪。

我的工作是理解如何握武器，如何使用武器，如何连接招式，使用这些武器时人类身体应该做出什么动作，物理现象如何影响近战，以及人们如何对暴力行为做出（生理上和心理上的）反应。详情通常包括不为人知的握紧动作、装甲、姿势和不同步法如何互相关联的例子。我保证你在电影、电视、游戏、舞台表演或仪式庆典上看不到这些元素。这正是我希望开发者们在制作游戏时考虑到的细节—-而不是复制复本。

修正核心假设

当你开发游戏战斗系统或制作一系列战斗动画时，你要以一套核心假设为基础：关于武器的抓握方式、装甲功能、引起的伤害、对手对暴力的情绪反应、身体和四肢对伤害的反应，以及真正的战士如何学习武术技能。

自然而然地，如果你的战斗模拟器建立在相当肤浅（或甚至错误的）核心假设之上，那么你的游戏就会让玩家觉得别扭。即使你的游戏在战斗机制和动画方面走的是比较风格化的路线，仍然值得花时间理解真正的战斗如何转化到你的游戏的核心假设之中，这样你至少理解了你能风格化什么以及为什么。我提到的武术的知识和历史上存在的战斗技巧是非常实用的参考材料，只要开发者们能多花一些心思。

没有这种现实基础，游戏动画师往往会复制夸张的舞台战斗的错误形式，接受来自用恶劣的武器模拟器假装的招式，或者复制某些传统打斗的程式化的动作。进而，玩家得到过分简单化的打斗和结合了连续旋转、跳跃和各种无用的（甚至自杀的）、违背常识和基本的生物力学的动作的笨拙姿势。同时，玩家并没有使用到出自真正的战斗方法的大量更富动态、复杂的招式、闪避和其他反击动作

我经常看到游戏中的角色挥舞着武器，特别是剑，其熟悉的动画和打斗动作相当粗糙和野蛮。例如，典型的欧洲双刃长剑有16个可能的攻击方向。然而，玩家能看到却只有取自日本剑道或现代击剑和舞台表演的三四种相同的标准招式。简直就是小孩子玩杂耍。使用真实武器的丰富动态和方法—-闪避、砍杀、穿刺、切割和位移等，完全看不到。

当然，非并的所有带剑的游戏都必须成为刀剑战斗模拟器，但我相信，这些软件之所以不知道如何让玩家执行这些动作，是因为开发者们自己一开始就没有意识到这些东西的乐趣。然而，只要多下一点功夫和关注，我认为开发者们可以使用这些真实的战斗技巧模拟出更丰富的战斗系统。

开发和展示：致命的结合

无论何时我把挥剑招式展示给游戏开发者们看，他们的第一反应通常是“哇！”他们从来没有见过有人像我那样移动或那样熟练地挥剑，当然不是见到真人而是在YouTube上。当我表示这些动作是普遍的，且适用于所有武器，无论是匕首是矛还是剑加盾牌，开发者们会告诉我：“哇，我们不必再使用相同的旧玩意了，我不知道你竟然可以这样拿武器，我不知道你可以那样攻击目标，我不知道战士可以这样站，那样移动。”

现实主义不是封闭的，而是开放的。使用某种武器、一个接一个的招式、或一种招式被另一种招式打断、干扰和反击，设计师可以从中看出这种开放性。战斗不必呈现为我们所熟悉的“回避-反击，回避-反击，猛击，转身”模式。

对于幻想游戏中的战斗，现实主义是一个贬义词；它是一切活动可以且应该作为开始的中心点。现实主义不会给游戏设计师戴上锁。它是一个强大的工具，会让你觉得：“哇，我现在已经有可靠的设计基础了。”一旦你有了可靠的参考来源，你的想象就可以真正起飞了。

（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Art of War: Animating Realistic Sword Combat

by Eben Bradstreet, John Clements

Eben Bradstreet on Real Combat

The first time I walked into John Clements’s Iron Door Studio, I learned how to hold a longsword.

I thought it was obvious: Grip the handle with both hands. That’s how I’d always imagined it was done. It’s how they did it in the movies, after all. The handle is the comfortable bit between the pommel and the cross-guard. It’s large enough to accommodate both hands. So I hold it there, right?

Wrong. The right hand (or the leading hand) indeed goes just below the cross-guard. The left hand should grip the weapon by the pommel — that’s the knob at the end of the handle — in most circumstances.

At first, I was a little dubious. “Hold it there? Really? I thought that part was just for smashing skulls. Or balance. Or decoration.”

My mind drifted to Orlando Bloom in an early scene in Kingdom of Heaven, where it’s quite clear that he grips his weapon in the way that seems most harmonious: by the handle, with both hands. Later in the film, he even helpfully confirms my bias by smacking someone in the noggin with his hand-free pommel.

Figure 1: The proper way to hold a longsword.

The reality of the pommel is a little more complicated. It is used to knock sense into your enemies, it does affect the balance of the sword, and sometimes it’s even pretty to look at. But, it’s also a great place to hold the weapon. And it’s a perfect example of how all my assumptions about the sword were challenged when I first set out to learn the reality of the weapon.

Grounding Fantasy in Reality

As it turns out, how to hold the longsword is also a great place to start talking about what that reality can mean for animators. If a video game character grips the pommel with its trailing hand, the resulting animation will have fewer problems with deformation around the wrist, less clipping between the sword’s mesh and the character’s mesh, and will display better biomechanics when cutting (which we’ll talk about later).

The first two points are subtle improvements, and are best demonstrated by gripping the handle by both hands, then extending the sword forward, holding the weapon at eye-level. From this position, start turning, windmilling, and cutting with the weapon while keeping it in front of you. If you don’t have a sword immediately available, you can do this with any wooden or plastic dowel. Just hold the dowel roughly three to five inches from the end in order to simulate the exposed pommel.

As you swing, pay attention to how often the pommel wants to intersect with your wrist, especially when you try to drop the blade to the lower right, and note that in some positions, you can’t continue an arc because your trailing wrist simply won’t contort enough to facilitate the movement.

As I said, these are subtle points. The real magic happens when you now try the same thing, but grip the pommel, instead of the handle, with your left hand. The first thing you’ll notice is just how much more leverage you have. The sword is a lever, after all, and your leading wrist is the fulcrum, so it makes sense that the further back from the fulcrum you’re able to grip, the more control you’ll exert on the blade. You should also notice that this method is easier on your wrist (which will help with deformation), especially if you allow the pommel to slide and turn freely in your palm. Your wrist can now stay relatively straight through most swings, and there’s no longer any danger of the pommel clipping through the wrist’s mesh on your character models.

Bad Sword, Bad Reference, Bad Animation

Inevitably, you’ll want to capture some reference. Even if you’re using motion capture, it’s always good practice to “feel” the movement yourself, or to whip out a camera and go through some of the motions.

The best way to not get good reference, no matter how you decide to hold the sword, is to use a crappy weapon. For most people, the easiest access they have to a generic sword is either through a catalogue, a renaissance faire, or even the odd novelty store. With the rare exception, the weapons you get from these sources are universally terrible for your animations — they’re often much too heavy and poorly balanced.

We have one of these weapons at my workplace, and even after two years of swinging steel as a martial art, I still can’t do anything with it. That weight transcends physical reality, and every skilled attempt to mitigate it directly influences how our characters move. It’s an awkward and sluggish prop that makes our characters look equally awkward and sluggish. Early on, we decided not to use it.

Instead of trying your luck with weapons that will harm your animations, it’s almost always better to simply go to a hardware store and buy a wooden dowel, or a length of weighted PVC pipe. If you’re feeling crafty, you might even want to make your own wooden sword (historically called a “waster”). Wooden props like these will certainly be much lighter than steel, but they’ll be easier to swing in a good way (good for the director, the animator, and the actor). The alternative is a poor knockoff that will cheapen your results by virtue of your trying to use it, rather than just hanging it up and staring at it (as it was made for). Bad swords make your job more difficult than it has to be.

The weapons that John and I are using in these images are made by Albion Swords (www.albion-swords.com). There can be long waiting times for these weapons, so it may not be an ideal solution for gathering good reference quickly or cheaply.

All About Universal Biomechanics

As I learned more about the art of fighting with the longsword, as Medieval and Renaissance Europeans understood it (and actually chronicled in dozens of study guides), I began to understand how intuitive the whole skill set actually was. There are a few basic guards, roughly nine vectors of attack, and a handful of rules that guide your footwork. The more advanced techniques, while impressive to look at, are largely ancillary: In all the sparring matches I’ve seen, the flashier techniques are never used. In fact, the more I watched and the more I learned, the more it started to feel familiar.

That sense of familiarity didn’t come from the movies or the stage — and certainly not from the highly sportified world of foil fencing. No, the moves I was seeing in sparring matches, which were reflected in the historical imagery plastered on the walls around me in John’s studio, looked more like the close-quarters combat training we’d done while I served in the Army, or mixed martial arts matches on TV. It was savage and in-your-face. There was nothing at all pompous or chivalric about it. This stuff was real, and it was universal — because no matter what time or place we come from, we’re all human and we’re all governed by the same biomechanics.

Consider the weapon we’ve been talking about. If I had been handed this weapon three years ago and someone told me to swing it, I would have done what pretty much anyone would do. Maybe swing it like a baseball bat, or because I used to cut wood when I was kid, I might swing it like an ax. If you were handed that weapon, what would you do? You might try to mimic what you’d seen Conan do, or imitate a samurai.

What you wouldn’t do (at least, what most of us wouldn’t do), is swing it like a golf club. But why not? Both are roughly the same length, both are used to hit things, and both do most of their business up to five inches from the end. Certainly, to swing a sword like a golf club and connect would be devastating to your target. So why don’t we use it that way?

The answer is biomechanics and perception. Biomechanically, it’s not efficient: The target of a golf club is at ground level, where the target of a sword is at eye level. Because the difference in targets is so drastic, we instinctively perceive that to swing a sword like a golf club is wrong.

Now let’s use this thought process to delve a little deeper: Think about the target of your animations, and where your character’s enemies are located. Is swinging the weapon like a baseball bat the solution? Consider the game you might be working on: In an environment where your character is trying to kill people, the target of your swing is more likely to be the pitcher (in front of you), than the ball (next to you at the moment you swing). Is it still correct, then, to stand like a batter, and swing as though you’re trying to hit the ball? Probably not.

So now we can take a step back and ask ourselves: “What is the best practice?” Nothing beats calling in an expert, of course, but even if you don’t have the time or resources for that, putting in a little effort in developing your fundamental understanding of human biomechanics with respect to weapons can help clean up your animations in a major way.

Realism Plays Well with Your IK Rig

As I stated earlier, the basics of Renaissance fencing and martial arts (the discipline we call “MARE,” or Martial Arts of Renaissance Europe) are pretty straightforward, and once you understand them, the rest becomes a matter of relentless conditioning and practice.

For the purpose of the animator, however, the basics can be a great starting point that will give your warriors a unique visual silhouette, without requiring the animator herself to become a scion of martial prowess.

Once you’re comfortable with holding the sword, the best place to start thinking about animating a swordsman is to understand the basic stances: what we call “tip progressions” or “guards.”

For the purpose of our animation, it’s best to think of these stances as our idle positions.

As you begin to employ these idles, you’ll notice that no matter what sequence of cuts your characters perform or what direction they face, they will always end their movement in one of these poses. They work fluidly and efficiently with each other, and they emphasize control and tactical positioning.

The four primary guards, as illustrated by John in Figure 2, are (from top to bottom) Phlug, Alber, Vom Tach, and Ochs.

Figure 2: The four primary guards: Phlug, Alber, Vom Tach, and Ochs.

What you’ll also notice is that they play very well with your inverse kinematics rig. Like the algorithms that drive your rig, the weapon leads the motions, just like your IK target leads your animation. You’ll also notice that the torso and arms seem to move almost independently of the legs. What’s more, as you step through the footwork, you’ll find that you can pivot your character around on a single foot, and stepping forward or backward is a simple matter of just mirroring your animation across your center plane.

Of course, these idles require the context of the basic cuts (called “Master Cuts”) to be fully appreciated. Rather than go through the entire catalogue of idles, transitions, and cuts, I’d like to illustrate my point with a particular sequence.

In Figure 3, I start at the top in a fifth guard, called Nebenhut. Note how my leading leg is bent, and the trailing leg is straight. Also note how my feet are at a 45-degree angle to each other. Let’s pretend that a new enemy has presented itself to my rear, and I want to turn 180 degrees to meet the new threat. Rather than shuffle around and swing my blade awkwardly in an attempt to maintain Nebenhut, I opt instead to hold the sword steady.

Figure 3: Example of turning 180 degrees between two guard positions.

As I begin to turn, my head and torso rotate first, followed by my trailing foot, which ends at 120 degrees (as relates to my left foot). On the third step to this sequence, I shift my weight onto my right leg, which is now my leading leg, and I deliberately bring my trailing foot to its new position. Notice that now our Nebenhut has transformed into Alber. To end the sequence, I lift my weapon out of Alber, and into Phlug.

Despite turning my entire body to face a new direction, my right wrist (the presumed target of our IK), never changed position. Also, until I lifted the weapon at the end, the sword remained almost entirely motionless. Note that for my entire turn, the ball of one foot remained planted in a single position (please ignore the general position shift at step three; a wall was in the way, so I had to move back).

This theme of always returning to our basic guards continues to manifest even as we begin striking. In Figure 4, we see John start in a Vom Tag, and then step forward into a strike. What follows is a rapid rotation of the weapon to strike again from the opposite angle. He repeats this rapid back-and-forth several times, striking at a different angle on each pass.

Figure 4: A sequence of strikes starting in Vom Tag.

Despite the change in vector for every strike, John always returns to Vom Tag before striking again. He doesn’t do this because he’s necessarily trained himself to perform this specific transition for its own sake; he does it because it’s the most biomechanically efficient way to pass from one strike to the next. This phenomenon is particularly useful for animators, because at any point between strikes we can end our sequence without popping into an idle pose, potentially jarring players out of their immersion.

Start Real, Then Exaggerate

Exaggeration is, fundamentally, one of our jobs as animators; we make our characters perform like an actor would perform on stage or on camera. Reality is always exaggerated or altered to fit the needs of a production. But whether you’re talking about Jade Empire or Call of Duty, you should always start with a solid foundation in reality. For games in medieval or fantasy settings that include sword combat, taking inspiration from the right sources (like MARE) can set your combat animation apart and make the task of animating cleaner and easier.

John Clements: Give Reality a Chance

Imagine if game designers had never seen or heard of serious Asian martial arts, and never made any game with such influences. Then, one day, a budo master or kung fu expert steps up and says, “Hey, I think you could make some really interesting things using our unique craft as a resource. We move in really neat ways that you haven’t explored.” I like to think that game developers would quickly see that there was something significant and sophisticated there worth examining. They probably wouldn’t respond with conceited indifference — which I’ve seen firsthand when I bring up the historical medieval combatives I study, teach, and practice.

People in The Know

I’ve been studying Medieval and Renaissance close combat for over three decades. I make my living writing and researching on the subject and operate the world’s only private facility dedicated exclusively to the craft. I am no stunt fighter, costumed performer, nor showman entertainer, but an accomplished martial artist who teaches an authentic combative discipline following genuine sources. Study of these historical fighting methods is my life’s passion and my career.

Now, I don’t think that everyone who makes a game in a medieval or fantasy setting needs to make a 100 percent accurate hand-to-hand combat simulator any more than I want to see the next Call of Duty game stop working forever after your character dies for the first time.

I do think, however, that the hardworking developers who make these games would have an easier time (and make even better games) if they drew from more realistic sources of inspiration when it comes to medieval combat.

The funny thing is, we already know this to be true. Just take a look at the original Prince of Persia, where creator Jordan Mechner filmed his brother actually walking, jumping, and going through some rudimentary fencing motions as the basis for its rotoscoped animations and action. That game was an influential breakthrough, but later titles would essentially copy and embellish upon those sequences, and the titles after that would copy the copies — and so on until the insightful grounding in realism of the original source was lost.

Drawing From the Source

This process is common sense; if you are doing a modern special ops game, you consult with authorities of that profession. If you’re doing a boxing game, you consult with a professional boxer. If you’re doing an aircraft fighter game, you consult with a fighter pilot. If you’re making a game about samurai, you certainly want to get the form and movements right by working with budo experts. When you copy the copies of copies, you get ever further from your original realistic base — which means you’re adopting the same embellishments and limitations that each successive generation of copies did without looking back at the real source material to see what your real design and animation options could be.

For example, a designer might see a fighting move in a movie and think, “This looks cool. I wonder how I can devise a mechanic for players to do that?” But what of the possibility that what they witnessed is mere nonsense; an inferior action the game maker is just not qualified to evaluate? What if there are better alternatives? What if the “real thing” — a general principle of self-defense, or some element of employing a particular weapon, or a specific combination of techniques — is actually cooler? If the designer doesn’t get the move from the right source, with a proper explanation of how it works and why, they will be missing out on how it fits in with the “game” of hand-to-hand combat, and won’t be able to use that understanding as inspiration for how it could fit in with the game they’re designing.

Yet this is more or less the general process I have seen for devising archaic close combat in games, and when I point this out, developers often feel insulted. Why? Aside from perhaps offending the creative sensibilities of designers, it’s because I am suggesting that (gasp!) people who design games are not themselves also experts in the authentic sources of historical close combat. They have not trained long-term with accurate weapons in those methods, and they do not have extensive hands-on experience in striking realistic target materials with sharp weapons using genuine techniques, nor do they usually fit the profile of athletes conditioned to rigorous training in armed fighting skills. It seems like kind of a strange thing to be offended by. After all, most people haven’t!

My job is to understand how such weapons handle, how they’re maneuvered and manipulated, how they engage one another, what type of techniques and motions the human body is really capable of with said weapons, how physics affects melee combat, and how people respond (physiologically and psychologically) to violent actions. The specifics often include examples of how little-known gripping actions, armor, postures, and different footwork are all interconnected. These elements are ones I can guarantee you have never seen in any movie, TV show, game, renaissance faire performance, or choreographed routine. It’s this knowledge and these details which I hope to see developers take inspiration from while building their own games — instead of copies of copies.

Correcting Core Assumptions

When you develop a game combat system or a series of combat animations, you do so based upon a certain set of core assumptions: assumptions about how weapons and swords handle, about how armor functions, about what wounds could be causes, about how people respond emotionally to personal violence, how bodies and limbs react to injury, and about how real fighters learned martial skills.

Naturally, if you’re building a combat simulator off of a relatively shallow (or even erroneous) set of core assumptions, your game won’t feel right. Even if your game intends to take a more stylized approach to its combat mechanics and animations, however, it’s worth investing the time to understand how the reality of combat translates into your game’s core assumptions, so you at least understand what you’re stylizing, and why. The martial knowledge and historical combat skills I’ve redeveloped permit developers to paint with a far richer palette of colors, if only the effort is made to pay some attention.

Without this realistic base, a video game animator ends up replicating the bad form capture of exaggerated stage combat, accepting impressions from pretend bouts with poor weapon simulators, or copying the ritualized movements of some traditional fighting style. The consumers in turn get simplistic strikes and rigid blocks delivered from static, unwieldy postures combined with incessant spinning, whirling, leaping, and assorted useless (and even suicidal) actions that defy both common sense and basic human biomechanics. Meanwhile, a wealth of more dynamic and sophisticated movements, wardings, and alternative counterstriking actions from genuine fighting methods remain untapped for gamers.

I regularly see weapons, particularly swords, wielded by characters in video games in which the familiar figure animations and fighting motions are primitive and crude. For example, there are 16 possible lines of striking for the typical double-edged European longsword. Yet, players are repeatedly offered only the same standard three or four strokes taken right out of Japanese swordplay or borrowed from modern saber fencing and stage combat. It’s little more than how children manipulate Nerf swords. All the diverse dynamic motions and distinct manners of adeptly manipulating a real weapon — with its wards, cuts, thrusts, slices, closures, and displacements — are entirely absent.

Certainly, not every game with a sword needs to be a sword-combat simulator, but I am confident the software does not know how to allow players do them because developers themselves aren’t aware that these things are interesting — or even possible — in the first place. With a little effort and attention, however, I think developers could use these realistic historical combat skills to paint with a richer palette of colors.

Devs and Demonstrations: A Deadly Combination

Whenever I demonstrate for game developers, the initial reaction is often simply “Whoa!” They’ve never seen someone move the way I do or wield particular weapons as adeptly, and certainly not in person instead of on YouTube. And when I demonstrate that these movements are universal and apply to all weapons, whether it’s a dagger or spear or a sword and shield, something seems to click. Developers tell me, “Wow, we won’t have to use the same old things again, I didn’t know that you could hold a weapon that way, I didn’t know that you could strike with it that way, I didn’t know it was possible for someone to step and pose in such a way, moving from one to another in that way.”

Realism doesn’t close doors. It opens them. Designers can see that with one kind of weapon, one certain type of move can come after another or that one move has a counter, or a certain position can be interfered with, stifled, or interrupted by another. Combat doesn’t have to be the familiar “parry-riposte, parry-riposte, whackety-whack-whack, swirl-swirl” pattern.

Realism is not a dirty word for combat in fantasy games; it’s a center point from where everything can and should begin. Realism doesn’t lock you in or freeze you in place as a game designer. It’s an empowering tool that lets you say, “Wow, I’ve got a really strong foundation to build on now.” Only once your feet are grounded in the right place can your imagination really take off.(source:gamasutra)