(Next Gen Edition) Combat Stance

Short description

This mod tries to improve combat stance and softlock and provides a menu with options to tweak stances and softlock to your liking.

Enhanced Targeting (Next Gen Edition) is highly recommended to use with this mod. If playing with KB&M, use Closest enemy preset for best experience.

It is also recommended to use E3 Improved Combat Animations mod (Next Gen Edition update, original mod can be found here) that does a better job of choosing attack animations based on range than vanilla.

Long description

By default TW3 combat works like this: Geralt sees an enemy/enemies, assumes his default combat stance, switches to slow walk and softlocks to an enemy. While in this mode, he automatically adjusts his position to face the enemy and all his attacks and sign casts go into that enemy's direction. He also automatically slides to the target if he's too far away. So, you can basically forget about movement and camera controls and just press attack/evade keys - everything else Geralt will do automatically for you.

While very convenient for a casual playthrough, this automation can create problems, if you're trying to be more tactical on higher difficulty levels or with certain DLC bosses.

There exist other mods that disable softlock permanently. Such mods also disable combat orientation altogether and make Geralt attack and cast signs in the direction of the camera. As a side effect, they also end up disabling auto-aimed crossbow shots and bomb throws.

This mod uses different approach: instead of just removing the feature entirely, it tweaks it to give the player more control.

Mod features:

[]The mod doesn't break hardlock. You can still use it at any time during combat to attack a specific enemy.

[]The mod does not disable auto-aimed crossbow shots and bomb throws. You can aim manually, if you want, but when you shoot without aiming, all your shots go into the direction of an enemy you're currently hardlocked or softlocked to.

[*]The mod respects movement input when not soft/hardlocked, i.e. when you're actively moving Geralt with movement controls, all his attacks go to the direction he's currently facing and not to the direction of the camera. However, if you don't touch the movement controls and move your camera instead, the attacks go to where your camera is currently aimed at. For me personally it makes the huge difference as while aiming with camera is perfect for an FPP game, in TPP game I tend to look