Combat in Assassin’s Creed 3

Overview

Assassin’s Creed III has a relatively simple combat system, and it doesn’t take a lot to master it. I’m here to teach you the very few things there are to know.

A Little Bit of History

But first, some history. Because clearly, that’s what you all came for.

‘Regulars’ is a term referring to members of the British Army during roughly the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th. You’ll also hear them referred to colloquially as ‘Redcoats’ or ‘Lobsterbacks’, on account of the easily recognisable red jackets they wore. In Assassin’s Creed III, the Regulars are the ‘bad guys’, since they policed the American colonies before the Revolutionary War, and naturally were the enemies of the ever-popular revolutionaries. Of course, they themselves probably felt pretty ticked off, as would you if thirteen colonies of angry Americans suddenly decided they didn’t like you and violently sent you back to jolly old England.

Formed by the Continental Congress in 1775, the Continental Army was established to fight for colonial independence in the American Revolution. It was led by Commander-in-Chief George Washington, who a few of you may have heard of. Soldiers were recruited from each of the thirteen existing American colonies at the time.

Your Moves

Let’s start with what you can do yourself. Ratohnhaké:ton doesn’t have a lot of moves, but the subtlety is in using them in conjunction with each other. Note that almost none of these moves work on all enemy types. More on that later on.

This one isn’t particularly difficult to understand, no matter how intelligent you are. Essentially, a press of the left mouse button (X on a controller) will make your character swing the equipped weapon at the nearest enemy. You can use the left analogue stick to direct this attack at a specific enemy. Attacking a certain amount of consecutive hits on one enemy (the required amount determined by the weapon used) will begin a kill-streak.

Still simple here. Pressing the space bar (A on a controller) makes Ratohnhaké:ton break an opponent’s defence. It’s worth noting that using this move twice consecutively on the same enemy will knock them off their feet, making for an easy instant kill.

Possibly the most important action is the counter. Pressing E on the keyboard (B on controller) while an enemy is attacking (indicated by a red SSI icon) will counter his attack. However, simply pressing counter does not counter the attack. Once an attack is blocked, the game will enter into a very brief slow-motion stage, during which your actions will determine what Ratohnhaké:ton does. Pressing the attack button during this time will counter-kill the enemy, instantly killing him. Pressing counter will throw the enemy in the direction you decide with the movement keys (useful when fighting near water or on rooftops). Break defence will disarm him, and pressing the secondary attack button will counter-kill him using whatever secondary weapon you have equipped. Worth noting that the secondary counter-kill only works with the pistol, bow or rope dart. Pressing nothing during the slow-motion time will cause neither Ratohnhaké:ton nor his foe to take any action, and they’ll just sort of awkwardly fumble a little.

Pressing Q (Y on controller) makes Ratohnhaké:ton attack the selected enemy with his secondary weapon. In combat, the only secondary weapons that are truly useful are the pistol, bow and rope dart, although the smoke bomb may be included in this as well. Note that pressing secondary attack while using a heavy weapon will cause you to perform a massive, unblockable attack which instantly kills any enemy, no exceptions. The downside to this is that you actually drop the weapon, although you can simply pick it up again or go to a general store and re-equip it.

Holding the counter button will adjust your character’s stance into a parrying stance. Essentially how this works is that as long as you hold the button, the only things that can hit you are gunshots and heavy swings from axe-wielding enemies. Any other attack is harmlessly deflected.

This one’s easy. In large fights, enemies wielding muskets will often form firing lines—hastily constructed formations where everyone basically lines up and shoots at you. These are indicated by yellow SSI icons. Pressing the break defence button near an enemy will pull him toward you and use him as a shield against the firing line, killing him and avoiding damage in the process. Note that several enemy types can simply shoot you without forming a line at all, although you will still get the on-screen prompt to grab a human shield.

More Moves

A kill-streak is an event in which Ratohnhaké:ton can kill enemies with a single press of the attack button. Kill-streaks begin when you either counter-kill an enemy or hit one a certain amount of times. However, certain enemies will counter you if you try to add them to your kill-streak, after which you will take damage and the streak will end.

Perhaps the simplest attack in the game to execute, it is also the most efficient single attack. By pressing the counter button when two enemies are attacking you at once (yellow SSIs don’t count) Ratohnhaké:ton will perform a very cool animation, killing both enemies instantly. It is rare that this will happen with enemy types other than the soldier, but miracles happen.

Pressing the secondary attack button in place of the attack button during a kill-streak will cause Ratohnhaké:ton to do yet another cool animation, killing two enemies with one pistol shot.
Somehow.

Enemies

There are a few different types of enemies in Assassin’s Creed III. Before I list them, however, here are a few things that apply universally to all enemy types.

• They cannot swim—throwing them in the water will instantly kill them.
• They cannot block or avoid being used as a human shield.
• They cannot block a counter-kill that uses the secondary attack.

Each enemy type, however, has strengths and weaknesses, and the above points are just about the only shared weakness they all have.

Just your regular old soldier. They carry muskets, and can form firing lines. Besides that, they are vulnerable to every single attack or counter. Despite being the weakest enemy in the entire game, soldiers are very common, and large groups can be a problem as they form firing lines frequently.

Grenadiers carry axes or muskets. They are vulnerable to both the disarm counter-attack and the break defence move. They use two different attacks. The first has a red SSI indicator, and can be countered. The second uses a yellow SSI. This attack is slow, and grenadiers only use it when wielding an axe.If you press counter with the correct timing, Ratohnhaké:ton will roll in any direction. The direction itself doesn’t affect anything, since as long as you are rolling when the swing goes through, Ratohnhaké:ton will not take damage. However, the grenadier takes a split-second to recover after swinging. This can be used to your advantage for an instant kill–rolling just to the left or right of the grenadier when he swings will position you directly behind him. Attacking him from behind in this way will drop him in one hit. You can actually start rolling before he even swings, as long as the SSI has appeared. This makes it much easier to get the instant kill, as he hasn’t even attacked by the time you’re behind him.

Rarely, a grenadier will pull a hand grenade out and toss it toward you, indicated by a yellow SSI and the blatant fact that, you know, they are THROWING A GRENADE AT YOU. Despite all your experience in those weird Indian action movies that everyone loves and no-one understands, you cannot block this. The best thing to do is to immediately stop slaughtering people and sprint away from the grenade. If you’re fighting in a narrow alleyway, this can be used to your advantage, as all the enemies will try (for good reason) to avoid being exploded to bits. They’ll often all run to one side of the grenade. If you’re on the other side, you can often get a pistol shot or a few arrows in while they stand helpless. You can also use a smoke bomb as the grenade is thrown in order to cause all enemies to stand stunned, and then die horribly.
What a mess.

Commonly found at the head of a marching group of soldiers, the officer uses a one-handed sword or a musket, and are vulnerable to the disarm counter. They also have access to pistols, which they can use against Ratohnhaké:ton without forming a firing line, which is obviously fairly dangerous if you’ve just slaughtered every enemy in sight and don’t have a human shield within reach.

The scout uses small weapons such as hatchets and dirks. They are impervious to the disarm counter, but all other counters work. The scout has a secondary attack which is—similar to the grenadier’s secondary—indicated by a yellow SSI marker. Pressing counter when they do this will cause the scout to roll over Ratohnhaké:ton’s back, after which they always follow up with a regular attack.

The Jäger is the most challenging and powerful enemy in Assassin’s Creed III. They wield cutlasses, and appear once you have raised your notoriety to level three by performing despicable acts of senseless violence. You monster.

Jägers are not nearly as difficult to kill as everybody makes them sound. Head-on melee attack won’t harm them, and the only attacks that they do not block are the disarm counter and secondary counter-kill. Once disarmed, they can be attacked normally and killed. Note that you should kill the Jäger as quickly as possible after disarming one, as they can pick up another fallen weapon and use it, requiring you to disarm them again to kill. Jägers also have a pistol, which they use identically to the officer. Furthermore, a Jäger can use hand grenades, same as grenadiers.

The snitch is an enemy type that is very easily recognisable. They carry large drums which they play while marching in a group. When conflict is initiated, the snitch will almost always run away, returning with more enemies. If he fights, he functions exactly the same as a soldier, except that he carries a dirk by default.

Melee Weapons

Using different weapons affects how you play–at least, that’s what you’d think. Truthfully, the main difference between different types of weapon is how fast they swing and the animations.

Melee weapons are the weapons you use in close combat, which means these are the objects you hit people with. There are three main types of melee weapon, and within each of these types there are various individual weapons to choose from. Here’s a run-down of each weapon type.

Small weapons are hatchets (or tomahawks) and dirks. They generally have fast attacks and animations.

Swords are long and sharp. They’re like small weapons, only larger. Besides this, they simply have different animations, but they do the same thing, in essence.

Heavy weapons include axes and clubs. Actually, in this game, axes and clubs are the only heavy weapons available at all. They function slightly differently to swords and small weapons. While using a heavy weapon in combat, your secondary weapon is replaced by a secondary attack, which instantly kills any enemy, regardless of type. The downside to this attack is that you actually leave the weapon lodged in the enemy skull, meaning you don’t have it anymore. After the fight ends, you can still pick it up again, though during combat this is impossible. If you do not pick up the weapon, going to any general store will allow you to re-equip it. If you plan on using this secondary attack in battle, note that at any given time, Ratohnhaké:ton can carry both a heavy weapon and a choice of either a sword or small weapon. What this means is that if you lose the heavy weapon, you can just switch to your other weapon and continue fighting.

Here’s an interesting one. A musket, if you don’t know, is a rifle with a bayonet (long miilitary-issue knife) attached. While it sounds like a ranged weapon, it’s actually one of the best melee weapons in the game. In combat, it’s like having a sword or small weapon and pistol equipped, but slightly different. You can still use the secondary attack, which fires the musket at the highlighted enemy, and it works as a melee weapon whether it is loaded or not. Note that the musket takes much longer to reload than the pistol, and that it can only be acquired by either disarming an enemy wielding one while unarmed or picking one up from one of the musket racks found within forts.

Yes, fists are a weapon, and an interesting one at that. For those of you unfamiliar with the basic human anatomy, fists are an evolved form of hands that occur when a human curls his or her fingers all the way together. In Assassin’s Creed III, using your fists in combat changes a few things. The first is that defeating enemies does not count as a ‘kill’, which is useful for story missions with optional objectives such as ‘Do not kill anyone’. The second, more important change is that using the disarm counter on an enemy vulnerable to it will not only remove their weapon, but it will give it to you. This is how Ratohnhaké:ton can acquire muskets. It also leaves the enemy unable to simply pick up the weapon again after you disarm them.

Secondary Weapons

Secondary weapons are a little more complex than melee weapons. Each has a different purpose (mostly) and there is more variation. While you can purchase different kinds of pistols, the bow, rope darts and smoke bombs will always behave the same. Also note that there are several other secondary items such as bait and snares, but for obvious reasons these have been omitted due to their uselessness in combat.

Flintlock pistols offer a single, unavoidable shot before requiring a lengthy reload. Pistols can be used in counters to instantly kill just about anyone. They can also be used to instantly kill soldiers, snitches and scouts. Pressing Q (Y on controller) will make Ratohnhaké:ton promptly shoot whoever is highlighted. Using F (LT on controller) will bring up a targeting reticule which can be used to accurately select a victim. Be careful that there are no civilians between yourself and the target, as they will be shot. Killing three civilians–even accidentally–will result in desynchronisation. Also cows. Cows count as civilians. So don’t shoot cows.

Being Kanien:kéhaka, Ratohnhaké:ton uses a bow, which is in some ways better than the more modern pistols. It can be used in counter-kills, and it does not require reloading, meaning you can just go crazy and shoot people repeatedly until you’re out of arrows. Notably, looting the corpses of people killed with the bow yields the arrow you used to kill him, making it more cost-efficient than simply purchasing more.
Another interesting thing. By chance, while attacking a random guard, (shut up) a civilian happened to walk between us just as the arrow left the bow. To my surprise, it killed both the intended target and the unfortunate passer-by. Looting both bodies, I found that I got one arrow from each of them. Which made me smile. Disturbingly.

Mostly used as a predator tactic, rope darts have uses in combat, too. Using one on an enemy will pull them to the ground, allowing for an easy kill, against any enemy type. They can also be used to perform a secondary counter-kill.

Smoke bombs are unique, in that they are the only secondary weapon that does not damage enemies, nor can they be used in counter-kills. Rather, using a smoke bomb will create a cloud of smoke, causing any enemies in it’s zone to be stunned and begin to cough. These can be used to make escapes from combat. Any enemies caught in the smoke are vulnerable to assassination, which is far quicker than combat kills. If you wish to utilise this, I advise using low-profile assassinations, as they have shorter animations than high-profile ones. That means do NOT hold down the right mouse button (RT on controller) while killing the blokes.

Poison darts aren’t actually darts, they’re little knives coated in cicuta, which is a type of poison. Once struck, any enemy will become ill, and after several seconds, they will flail about like a madman, before promptly dying. How rude.
These are only really useful for stealth, as they will draw all nearby enemies to the flailing man’s position. In combat, they are close to useless, although there are some creative mass murderers out there who would be able to come up with original ways to murder with these.
Make me proud, boys.

Weapon Stats

Each weapon has several statistics that apply to it. In the case of melee weapons, these attributes are Damage, Speed and Combo. The damage stat measures how much a regular attack with the item will hurt an enemy outside of a kill-streak. Speed affects how quickly an attack goes through, and combo refers to how many hits it takes to begin a kill-streak. Note: The number listed in the table is not a direct counter of the amount of hits required to begin a streak. It is simply a rating of efficiency, with higher ratings requiring fewer strikes to begin a streak.

Below are listed the statistics of every available melee weapon in Assassin’s Creed III.

While pistols still have stats, they work differently to melee weapons. The stats for pistols are Shots Loaded, Short Range (damage) and Long Range (damage). The damage stats recorded here are judged by how many shots it take to kill a grenadier at that range. Therefore smaller is better. Like with wounds.

Slightly More Advanced Things for Slightly More Advanced People

Some slightly more personal opinions in this section. I would personally advise that–if possible, you engage enemies either near water, a ledge or an area with many walls. The reason being throw counters into water will instantly kill the target, and attacking an enemy during a kill-streak while they are between you and a wall will also instant-kill them, slamming them into the wall.
Again related to positioning, you should always stay in the centre of a group, as you can clearly see who is attacking and when. Always keep the camera (controlled using the mouse (or right analogue stick on a controller)) either angled so that you can see all enemies or constantly moving in order to keep a good tactical awareness as to your enemies’ locations.
If you can, either kill all the enemies in one kill-streak or keep one nearby, in case of firing lines. If you want to keep an enemy alive, you can use the parry move (hold counter) to avoid damage while not killing him.

If you want to start a fight (and you probably do, being a savagely corrupt buffoon), you’l want to start with an assassination of some sort. Personally, I like to double air assassinate whichever enemy is the most troublesome. For instance, an average marching group of soldiers contains two or more soldiers, a snitch, an officer and either a grenadier or a scout. If possible, it would be best to target the snitch (to avoid reinforcements) as well as the grenadier, as the officer is usually not next to the snitch. It can be hard to aim an air assassination, as at most you can target one enemy at a time using the reticule. If you target one enemy, you will almost always assassinate whoever is closest to him. If you only want to air assassinate one person, simply select any weapon other than the hidden blades. Other ways of starting fights are to interact with disgruntled citizens, who will go on to attack guards. This is less advisable, as allies in combat get in the way, and can even attack you unintentionally, which cannot be countered. Using low profile assassinations from behind, you can actually kill an entire group of marching enemies, since nobody’s looking behind them. If you simply want to start a fight without killing anyone, bumping a guard while sprinting will cause him to investigate you. Standing still will cause him to attack.

Other Things

In several modern day missions, Desmond Miles is forced to do battle with Abstergo agents. Unlike Ratohnhaké:ton, Desmond only has access to the hidden blades as a weapon. Abstergo security guards fight exactly like soldiers, but they have access to pistols that work the same way as those of officers. In one mission, Desmond steals a modern handgun, which works as bow does, but with the need for a very short reload required every few shots.
To be honest, this probably doesn’t even justify having it’s own section, but I don’t care.

Enemies can also use an attack known as a grab–a name which makes a lot of sense, since it is in fact, a grab. When an enemy uses a grab, they grab you from behind, holding you in place. You can counter the grab by pressing counter or attack as the enemy grabs you, or you can break out of it in the same way after you’ve been grabbed. Countering the grab allows you to continue an active kill-streak, while simply breaking out will end your current kill-streak.

Notes

Couple of things I need to point out. Firstly, if anything here doesn’t make sense, or if I’m just plain wrong, please leave your hate in the comments. Ta.
Also, all of the pictures used are of Patriots for a pretty good reason. Spoiler alert, the American Revolution ended with the Patriots winning, which is why after finishing the game, you can only find Loyalists in certain areas.

Historically, Jägers fighting alongside the Patriots doesn’t really make sense, as they were only employed by the Crown during the Revolutionary War. I suppose they’re included with Patriots to balance out gameplay, so the Loyalists aren’t so much harder to fight.

Honestly, I swear this isn’t a game anymore.

• My guide to combat in Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood.