TLDR: please go back to the old Paladin animation, just make it look new. They changed how he moves and it’s not an improvement.
I was watching some side by side videos of old animation and new animation. There are a few things I find ‘odd’ in the decisions made. I feel comfortable enough in what I’ve seen that it isn’t just ‘unfinished’ animation but rather different design ‘decisions’.
Blessed Hammer: The old animation kept the shield up and the back foot planted. The new animation pulls the back heel off the ground and pushes the back hip forward, moving the shield completely out of the way. This is consistent to a Karate style ‘punching’ action, but really has no bearing on what should be done for sending out a magic hammer. The old action of keeping the shield up and the back foot planted seems much better IMO. There is really no need to put your ‘hip into it’ when releasing a magic hammer. It also lowers the shield which goes completely against the other animation they have with the shield always being up front.
Hips square vs ‘Open Hips’ – This is the theme for what I’ll be looking at for most of these. The new stance used is Open hip, the old stance is squared up. I’ll start by saying they are both perfectly valid stances and work perfectly well, but they do fall into favor in different spots. Open hips is what’s seen in a modern fencing stance, front knee forward, back leg back, hips at a 45-60 degree angle to your opponent. This is ideal for fighting one guy and using as much range as possible. It comes at the cost of stability and ‘circular’ movement. Square hips is more like what a Boxer, MMA fighter or wrestler uses. High stability, good movement on the circle and lower range. When facing multiple opponents it’s commonly recommended to square up your hips so you are better able to react to multiple attacks from multiple angels.
The shield in front…All the time: is great for fighting one guy in front of you. It’s also perfect for a shield wall where you only deal with the guy in front of you because your friends to each side have their shields right next to yours. It’s not that great for having people spread out in front of you at different angles. Shield only in front means you don’t get to react as well to the guys not directly in front of you. The original animation did not look like this, he was squared up it didn’t cause an awkward movement issue. This awkwardness is caused by trying to combine an open hip stance with running. You just can’t do it right, try it. Get in a fencing position and then run… you will naturally move to a ‘squared’ position because that’s how you run.
The Two handed stance looks great, it’s not as awkward as the shield animation it’s beautiful. It also is not appropriate or true to the original only because of the hip position. Same problem of ‘intent’ on fighting one guy or more…
All of the new animations use footwork that would be constant with fighting one person, not many. The original D2 employed a very squared up fighting position rather than an open hip position. This did look awkward in the low graphics of D2 but it is more appropriate considering the getting attacked from everywhere aspect of the game.
I also find it odd that the Amazon was not changed to this type of movement. She is very much accurate to the original even though her use of the shield should be exactly the same.
