This page contains basic information about combat and its mechanics/bars. This includes details on status bars, basic mechanics, and status effects.
Knowing this information is absolutely crucial to elongating your life, and will give any voyager a fighting chance when they inevitably enter a skirmish with their future adversaries, or worse-- allies.
GUI[]
There are many elements to the GUI, each one playing its own part. In order to have a chance at surviving, learning these are essential.
| Health Bar | A visual representation of the player's health. Players start with 200 Health; things like Fortitude (0.5 Health per Fortitude), Health bonus from Talents and Equipment, Vitality (10 Health per Vitality) and Power (4 Health per Power) increase the max health. Upon reaching 0% Health, the player gets knocked down and is at the mercy of anyone around them.
The player's Health bar has three states:  This is the normal state of the health bar.  This is the state of the health bar after dying once.  This is the state of the health bar in The Depths.
|
|---|---|
| Posture Bar | A visual representation of the player's ability to guard against attacks. Building this bar indicates negative standing, so you should do your best to keep this bar as low as possible when engaging in combat. When the bar cannot hold any more energy, the next blocked hit will instead guard break, dealing increased damage and stunning you.
 |
| Cooldown Icons | Icons that indicate whether or not the player can do certain actions. When these icons become reddened/grayed out, the specified action will be on cooldown.
 |
| Cooldown Indicators | Cooldown Indicators represent the cooldown for mostly everything in-game, from Talents like kick-off, propagandist, and audacity, to criticals, feints, Resonances, and even special attacks like Sudaruska's Fury. It has the name of the cooldown on the left side, and the amount of time until you can use it on the right. |
| Ether Bar | A visual representation of the player's Ether amount. Ether is Deepwoken's form of magic, and Mantras cannot be used without sufficient Ether.
 |
| Tempo | A visual representation of the player's Tempo. Tempo is gained by hitting or being hit, and increases Ether regen during battle, as well as permitting the player to vent if they have a certain amount of Tempo stored. Maximum Tempo starts at 120.
 |
| Armor Durability | A visual representation of the player's current armor durability. When this bar is depleted, the player's armor is considered "broken", and you will start taking damage as if you have no armor on at all.
Assuming you managed to pick up Exoskeleton or if you are a Vesperian, there will be two armor bars instead- the white representing Clothed Armor, and the green representing Natural Armor.  |
Let it be known that applying these things will take some time to master.
As you play the game and face hardships, knowing how to properly watch over these values will begin to come to you naturally. Ward your frustration should you become disappointed in your progress- there is still the road ahead, Pathfinder.
Maps[]
Upon talking to a shipwright or spawning a boat, you'll unlock the ability to write down your navigations.
With places that have not been explored yet obscured, and places you have already visited fully written. It also identifies you of your current location with a yellow (blue if in the depths) marker, and the waterlocks leading to the next Luminant. It will also provide you of the whereabouts of your guildmates with their first and last inital, and points of interest in your current location. You will also be shown if you cross out of the maps boundaries as an arrow to the side of the map.
If you have Dimensional Travel/Kamui in your possession, using a map inside of it will also inform you of your physical location.
Keybinds[]
Upon pressing the settings button, you can find a keybinds section next to the settings page. Keybinds will allow you to have two different keys for an action, with the first one already being there when you start. To revert something, all you would need to do is press the reset button next to the action you're changing.
Certain actions such as Ironsing's pull and Murmurs require you to have access to them on the slot you're currently using in order to change their Keybinds. Currently, you are unable to change Keybinds for sailing & ritual casting.
Survival Basics[]
These are stats that are you required to maintain in order to survive in the world of Deepwoken. These stats will gradually deplete over time during your travels, but the depletion can be sped up by varying environments, creatures, or other players.
- In order to survive, the player will need to eat food to replenish their Stomach and hydrate to replenish their Water. Many food items also contain water within them, such as the Mushroom Bisque, allowing you to regenerate both.
- Once both are depleted, you will begin to lose Blood and your health will be reduced to half of your max health.
- Once every bar reaches zero, you will enter a combat state and be rendered helpless unless you consume food within the next few seconds.
- These stats can be found at the bottom-left of your screen, in the main game.
| Blood | A visual representation of how much Blood is currently in the player's body. Being attacked or taking damage in some form will cause the player to lose Blood. Upon reaching zero Blood, the following happens:
Maximum blood increases with power, gaining ~10% more blood each power. Thus, the maximum amount of blood is doubled at power 10 and tripled at power 20, compared to the starting amount.
When healing at a campfire, your Water and Stomach will work together to replenish your Blood. |
  |
|---|---|---|
| Water | A visual representation of how much Water is currently in the player's body. Water isn't too vital for survival and will deplete over time. You will lose 50% of the bar upon vomiting. Upon reaching zero Water, the following happens:
Your Water will drain slightly faster when healing at a campfire or swimming. |
  |
| Stomach | A visual representation of how much food is currently in the player's body; essentially your hunger bar. You will lose 50% of the bar upon vomiting. Upon reaching zero Stomach, the following happens:
Your Stomach will drain slightly faster when healing at a campfire or swimming. |
  |
Inventory[]
Your inventory will be color-coded to assist you in finding types of items. Should you be unable to find an item in your mountain of objects, simply use the search bar in the bottom and type the item name in to quickly find it.
| Item Type | All items in you see in your UI whether in the inventory or in your hotbar have a color based off of what type of item they are. These categories take different priority in the sorting of your inventory so misc items like books will be seen at the bottom of your inventory while training items and utility like flint are seen at the top. Items also have a frame on them with the color defining its rarity or otherwise worth. Grey for common, yellow for uncommon, red for rare and cyan for legendary. Purple frames are seen on potions and enchants. Grey is always seen on elemental weapons like Crypt Blades. (These item frames aren't always correlated to the items drop-rate hence why some "Legendary" items may appear to drop commonly when you do the math)
|
|||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Abilities
1st place in the inventory. Consist of activatable Talents like; Chime of Dwelling, Guild Officer, and Call of the Deep. Also consists of active mantras, ones that aren't recalled. Weight: None |
Tools
2nd place in the inventory. Consist of usable items like campfires, fishing rods, gliders, harvesting tools, guild tools or hunters brace. |
Training Gear
3rd place in the inventory. Consist of items that train your characters attributes. Weight: None |
Equipment
4th place in the inventory. Consist of equippable armor and clothing pieces if you meet the req. Weight: 2 |
Weapons
5th place in the inventory. Consist of equippable weapons and off-hand items if you meet the req. Weight: 2 |
Schematics
6th place in the inventory. Consist of blueprints you can turn in at blacksmiths to craft them. The glider blueprint has no weight. Weight: 1 |
Quest Items
7th place in the inventory. Consist of items that train your characters attributes. Weight: None |
Consumables
8th place in the inventory. Consists of foods and potions. Weight: Varies |
Relics
9th place in the Inventory. Consists of Mythical Items that can rewrite fate, such as alloys that can enhance items, to books, parchment and idols that can change your resonance and knowledge. Weight: None |
Materials
10th place in the inventory. Consist of materials from foraging or chests that are used for crafting and or alchemy. Also consists of Mantra modifiers, ingredients that are used to further enhance mantras, such as increasing their size or range. Weight: Varies | |
| Carrying Capacity | Carrying Capacity, also known as Carry Load, dictates how much weight in items your character can hold before their speed is reduced and they can no longer safely have items. You may check an item's weight by hovering over the item in your inventory and seeing the number held in the small blue box in the corner. Hovering over the item may also give you a description along with a number of how many notes it'll sell for at a vendor.
There then exists a hard cap, upon reaching the cap; your carrying capacity will be colored red. Detailed when you try to carry more items than you're currently capable of. Eventually, your character will be unable to hold onto any more items, and enough items must be dropped to make room to pick up another. The closer you get to the hard cap, the slower your movement will be.
|
 | ||||||||
| Locking Items | By right-clicking on a sellable/droppable item, you can lock it. By locking it you prevent the item from being sold or dropped while giving it an appearance of chained borders. |  | ||||||||
Combat Basics[]
When fighting, while dealing damage is important, reducing their posture can also help in reducing the volatility of your fellow adversary. Should they block one of your attacks, rest assured that you still dealt some form of damage to them by placing them in negative standing.
| Attack | Left clicking (M1) allows you to swing your weapon, dealing damage to whoever is hit unless they block, parry, or dodge your attack.
In the case of getting your attack blocked, your attack will instead deal a different type of damage in the form of "Posture Damage", taking into account the weight of your weapon rather than your damage output.
When 4 hits are swung consecutively without pauses, your character will kick your adversary away in an action called a Flourish. This is an "end" to your string of swings, and has a small amount of endlag before you can swing again- which can be circumvented by casting a Mantra directly after the Flourish. Landing a Flourish causes the target hit to be launched away from you, essentially preventing an infinite combo. Flourishes can only be feinted by casting a mantra.
A hidden technique, subtly called Stepping, involves double tapping W during an M1, which will bring you closer to your opponent if you need to exploit range of your weapon and what your adversary may assume about your standing in combat. Suggested to only use this when necessary, as attempting to perform the required actions may put extra physical strain which will make it harder to perform other actions- as well as accidentally performing a Running Attack- unless you are used to the button combo.
|
|
|---|---|---|
| Critical Attacks | Critical Attacks, or "Crit(s)" for short, can be initiated by pressing R or clicking M3 (Pressing down the scroll wheel). Personally advised to use R .
Critical Attacks have various uses. Some work as a way to throw off your adversary's timing, such as the normal Sword critical or Rifle Spear critical. Others work as a way to help deal damage, such as the Dagger or Rapier criticals. Some others work as a combo tool, such as Spear criticals, while some others may be used to simply instill fear and discomfort in the opponent, such as a Kyrscleave critical.
|
|
| Parrying | Pressing the F key causes your character to enter a stance of deflection for a moment. Enemies hitting you during this timeframe have their attacks parried, causing them to be momentarily stunned and dealing posture damage to them, as well as reducing your own posture. It should be noted that whether your tap or hold F doesn't matter, as it will result in a parry at the beginning of the button press regardless.
Successful parries gives your character brief frames of auto-parry in which all incoming attacks are parried automatically. Parrying also resets its cooldown so that you may parry immediately again. It's also possible to attack during it's auto-parry frames, but this is difficult to do safely. Parrying will cancel all attacks (except for some monster attacks), as well as the damage for that attack, even if they come from behind your character. However, this is not the case for Blocking (see below).
Parrying physical attacks like Mantras or M1s will completely interrupt your opponents action, even if the animation continues. So, without their action getting in the way of their parry, they are able to parry whatever move you throw out next. This does not apply to all mantras however, especially projectile based ones. You may alternatively attempt to roll their mantra which MAY have an 100% chance of an M1 if you throw it out quick enough. Whilst Blocking and Parrying share the same hotkey (F), you'll perform a parry instead of a block if a parryable attack hits you during parry frames. You can know when you're currently in a state of parry frames by taking note of your character's distinct stance and hearing a subtle "whoosh" sound immediately after pressing F. |
|
| Blocking | By holding the F key after this stance of deflection has worn off, your character will hold their defensive stance and brace for incoming attacks, increasing your posture rather than lowering your health if you were hit during the block. The blocker can act slightly before the attacker, but not as much as if they parried. Remember, letting your posture exceed its maximum hold will result in you being block-broken.
|
|
| Venting | When the player has at least 40 Tempo (indicated by a small notch on the tempo bar), pressing the G key will make the player Vent.
Venting pushes others nearby away and grants a brief period of relief, allowing the player to get out of tricky situations such as being comboed or overcrowded, along with dealing a miniscule 5 damage, enough to cancel attacks and knock your adversary if they have sufficiently low health. Should the Vent fail to land or be parried/blocked, you will be stunned in place, unable to do anything. This will provide a window for your adversary to close in on you. Should you be lucky, this window won't be exploited.
Vents are parryable, blockable and rollable which all negate the knock back you'd normally receive. Parrying it however does stun the person venting in place as if they missed the vent. |
|
| Feinting | Right-clicking- otherwise using M2- during the moment your character pulls their weapon/arm back for a swing will allow you to fake-out the opponent with a Feint. You can also hold the button down which will feint your M1 as soon as possible and allows you to attack again even sooner more easily.
This allows you to play mind games with your adversary, and is very essential for mid-high level combat. For example, feinting can bait them to block- disabling their ability to parry and instead forcing them to roll. When they roll, you can follow through their roll and attack them through it.
Feinting has very slight end-lag, and will briefly disable your ability to make any attack for a very small moment. | |
| Dashing | Pressing Q allows you to Dash towards your desired direction, granting you immunity frames against most attacks, with the exception of a few.
You can roll-cancel by right-clicking- otherwise using M2- during the movement of your roll. For many experienced players, roll-canceling replaces Dashing as it is simply better in most cases, given that it cancels the endlag of your Dash as well as asserting yourself in combat and sizing up your adversary.
|
|
| Stance Change | Pressing the Y button will change your Stance from one-handed to two-handed. Many Light Weapons cannot switch their stance except for Fists, which can switch between their unlockable fist styles at will.
One Handed Stance: This stance defaults to Light and Medium weapon, and Heavy weapons can use this stance after obtaining 40 HVY. Offhand equipment, such as shields, parrying daggers, and guns will be accessible. An alternate idle animation is used if you do not have anything on your offhand. This stance increases posture damage dealt to the target when parrying but reduces posture damage dealt when hitting their block. Two-Handed Stance: This stance defaults to Heavy weapons, with Medium Weapons also having access to it. Any offhand equipment will be put away, such as shields. This stance increases posture damage dealt to the target when hitting their block but reduces posture damage dealt when parrying. |
|
| Stealth | When crouched, one can sneak up behind most humanoid enemies- excluding Songseekers for example- and M1 from behind to perform an Assassination.
If the target is not killed by the initial attack, it is recommended to swing at them as much as possible before they get up. They cannot be picked up if they aren't technically 'knocked' down.
|
|
| Uppercut | You may hit your adversaries up into the air with an Uppercut by pressing M1 while holding Ctrl. If your opponent is a monster, they will fail to rise with you and instead remain grounded.
Victims hit by Uppercuts are unable to block, and parry timing is seemingly tighter, which makes Uppercuts play a big role in combos. Comboing will keep you in the air, while feinting and parrying will drop both of you. Certain Talents- such as Flaming Uppercut and Quick Link- can also affect the potency of Uppercuts by adding properties to them the same way some Talents add properties to Flourishes.
Uppercuts have their own unique windup speed, regardless of whatever weapon type you may be using- making Uppercuts especially useful for Heavy users (and furthermore for those Gran Sudaruska users..). If you land an Uppercut against a dodge or block, then the reduced end-lag should allow you to strike your opponent with an M1 before they can retaliate. Landing a flourish on an opponent suffering from the stun of your arial combo will automatically kick them to the floor, which will result in any wall-bang Talents occurring- such as Bulldozer and Breathing Impact. Missing an Uppercut will completely immobilize you and leave you vulnerable- akin to failing to Vent, but you can typically parry an incoming attack if your opponent is on edge, or try an Uppercut yet again before full recovery. |
|
| Taunt | By pressing T, you can perform a taunt, colloquially refered to as a "spit" or "spitting". When taunting, the player character spits directly in-front of them. Whilst initially unassuming, the taunt has a special application in combat.
By spitting while your face is right up against another Humanoid's face (or perhaps spitting towards a Humanoid whilst they're facing the opposite direction you are when they're a few studs away from you), their vision will be briefly blurred (exact amount of time unconfirmed) and you will heal ~5% of your health and restore a large sum of your posture (exact amounts unconfirmed). This is a risky maneuver, though, as taunting has a considerable amount of startup and endlag, and you're usually better off just attacking your opponent. Due to this glaring flaw, the Taunt should only be used as a method of, well, taunting foes you deem inferior, or perhaps even as a risky mixup. Based on the name, it's possible that more taunts were meant to be added, but this is not confirmed by any developers. It's very likely that the developers simply wanted the Taunt to be a spit, though. |
On paper, this looks like a lot to memorize, but do not worry. These things will come more naturally as you play the game, just do not forget that these exist. Improving your combat potential and your ability to conquer those that stand in your way lies in your ability to master what must be mastered.
Status Effects[]
Status Effects are present throughout the game, whether it be fighting or exploring, e.g. being engulfed in flames by Flamecharm Mantras or stepping in acid pools in Erisia.
| Broken | Represented by torn-up clothes of the victim. Lose all defensive bonuses from the equipped outfit.
Occurs when armor durability reaches below 0%. |
 |
|---|---|---|
| Charmed | Represented by hearts on the victim's head.
If your adversary is charmed, you can deal extra damage and take less damage from them, by obtaining Talents such as Charismatic Cast and Tough Love. A common source is various Charisma Talents, such as Charismatic Cast and Unnecessary Theatrics, as well as the Sing Mantra. |
|
| Enraged | Represented by red glowing sparks emitting from the head of the victim.
The victim cannot jump. Damage output and intake is increased for both the user and target. The only source is from the Charisma mantra, Taunt. |
|
| Chilled | Represented by a blue mist engulfing the victim's body.
A common source is being hit by a Frostdraw Mantra, along with being hit by the bubbles of a Crustaceous Rex. |
|
| Burning | Represented by fire engulfing the victim's body.
A common source is being hit by a Flamecharm Mantra, along with being hit by one of Chaser's moves. |
|
| Paralysis | Represented by yellow sparks engulfing the victim's body.
Stuns for a slight moment, usually enough to land an extra hit. A common source is being hit by a Thundercall Mantra, along with being hit by The Ferryman. |
|
| Electrified | Confusingly, also represented by yellow sparks buzzing around the victim's body.
All outgoing attacks are converted to Electric/Thunder damage. Caster of this effect tends to pair this with Thunder-damage-reducing equipment/Talents to further nullify the victim's damage. Common source is being hit by Thundercall Mantras from users with the Thundercall Talent Resolve Crusher. |
|
| Winded | Represented by green particles surrouding the victim's body.
Attack speed is reduced. A common source is being hit by a Galebreathe Mantra. |
|
| Suffocate | Represented by crosses spinning around the victim's neck violently.
The victim will take slight damage over time and be unable to cast Mantras. A common source is being hit by a Galebreathe Mantra while the Galebreather has the World Without Song Talent. |
|
| Dazed | Represented by stars above the victim's head.
Speed greatly reduced. Cannot run or dodge until status wears off. A common source is being flourished against a wall, being flung and having your head hit a wall, or getting hit by the critical attack of a mace. |
|
| Anti-heal | Represented by purple mist surrouding the victim's body.
Every source of healing is disabled. This includes:
Does not proc/work on people in the same guild as yours. Sources are mudskipper broodlord and players with the Talent “All the Dead Gods” or Ring of Pestilence, which gives 50% healing reduction. Although, it doesn't emit any particles on the victim hit. |
|
Magic Basics[]
| Spell Casting | When you use a spell, it will deplete a certain amount of ether dependent on the volatility of the spell. You will hear a sound cue while casting, and timing your click to this will enable you to use the spell faster. There is also a visual cue, however, this differs from spell to spell. |
|---|---|
| Spell Feinting | Similar to the feinting system within the melee weapons, you are able to fake a spell and then quickly select another one for example, going for a fire grab and then quickly cancelling it to a fire AoE attack. You can also feint rituals however you need all the items for the ritual in order to start and stop it. It could be possible that there are consequences for cancelling ritual tier magic, so be careful. You may only cancel a few mantras in the game during their attack like Rapid Punches.
Spell feinting is performed by pressing M1 and then M2. Spell feinting will not refund the ether cost. It's possible to feint and feint your spell at the same time. Double feinting like this will often draw out your opponents parry and roll. It's still fairly possible to retaliate against but dealing with this technique is tricky, especially when used with very quick mantras which easily overwhelms most unexperienced players thought process. |
| Perfect Casting | Clicking M1 during a specific time of your Mantra cast will Perfect Cast it. The only use of this feature is to interact with some Talents. Though it might sound useless, certain Talents can give massive bonuses. All Talents that use perfect casting are listed here:
Though outside of these Talents, perfect casting is effectively useless. Do note though, that perfect casting Flame Grab and Jolt Grab may actually nerf it by shortening its range. Source. |
Advanced Movement[]
| Roll Cancel | When you roll, you can M2 similar to how feinting works and cancel your roll. Useful against enemies after perfect dodging to immediately attack or to fake out your opponent. Gives you the same i-frames as a normal perfect roll. |
|---|---|
| Ragdoll Cancel | After being ragdolled, you can M2 to do a backflip that ends the ragdoll early for some attacks- such as a Thresher tail whip. |
Alliances[]
The Alliance mechanic assists players in minimizing damage from friendly fire, rather than a complete damage immunity mechanic typically found in other games. In Deepwoken, the game runs an "ally check" when calculating damage or deciding to proc abilities. Players and NPCs considered allies will receive less damage dealt by you. Some Talents increase this effect further and can also proc additional effects.
Allies can view messages from you anywhere in a server through Shouts. In Dungeons and other instanced servers, all messages are automatically shouted to other allies in the server. In public servers, you can send a shout by prefixing your message with an exclamation mark (!). For example: "!give me 30,000 notes". It can also work through allies with Vow of Allegiance.
If you are in a guild, all other members of that guild are treated as allies. You can form alliances with players outside of your guild through a Vow of Allegiance. To form a Vow of Allegiance, you must say "Wanna make a vow of allegiance [name]?" near your target. The target can accept the vow by saying "yes", which will then show the confirmation window. There are no stat or Talent requirements to make this vow. Vows of Allegiance persist on the slot (not to be confused with the Character or Account), and each slot can only form 50 allegiances. You can break your Vows of Allegiance through a Yun’Shul wish (you must make this wish at the Temple of Hearts as the Idol of Yun'Shul does not have this option). However, this breaks ALL vows made on the slot.
The ally check can be disabled by turning on the "No Holds Barred" in-game setting, useful if you would like to spar with teammates as your attacks will deal normal damage and proc Talents/abilities that normally would not.
Trivia[]
- The overall parry-based combat is heavily inspired by Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, even possessing Perilous Attacks in the form of unparriable attacks. The inclusion and appearance of a Posture Bar is also very similar to Sekiro.
- The Health and Survival GUI has 5 separate bars in them that represent 20% each. This will help you to interpret damage dealt, health percentage, and help you to interpret the percentage of water and food each consumable fills.
- Taunting/Spitting on passive NPCs angers them. If you have at least 55 Charisma, though, they will instead say thank you for spitting on them.
- Some people refer to Ragdoll Cancelling as a Tech/Teching, a reference to a common mechanic in FGC Games where if you block/parry right before hitting a surface whilst being launched, your movement will be cancelled, you'll leave hitstun, and you'll be able to act again almost immediately.