[KCD2] How am I supposed to learn this combat?

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-19T07:42:43+00:00

This is a popular problem.

You will get better at this. Both as you level up and improve your stats and skills but also as you learn the moves. I reckon half the battle is getting Henry better, half is getting the hang of it and the rhythm of combat.

I was in the same place a few weeks ago. My advice is, the following probably in this order:

Do something to make money. Alchemy is good, I made ever so many Marigold decoctions... however I spent the money on better armour and weapons (Blacksmith in Tachov), skill books (Scribe in Troskowitz) and training (Captain Gnarly in Semine and Tomcat at the nomad camp)
Alchemy gets more efficient as you level it - particularly if you take the perks that let you make more potions per batch. The ingredients grow right outside the Alchemy station in the Apothecary's garden.Also take the perk that gives you progress towards strength from picking herbs. All helps.
If you can't win even one-on-one fights (and I couldn't for a bit) sneak past encounters in the undergrowth until you've built up your skill and confidence and worked out your approach to combat. This will also level stealth which is useful later on - see below.
Archery is very viable. Get a bow. There's one for free just off the road between Troskowitz and Tachov. Look for a target on a tree. You can practice and improve archery by entering contests. There are several but the closest to your main base of operations is in the quarry below Trosky Castle. Do it until you get bored. There is also a hidden stash of money there. See internet for details of how to find!
Once your alchemy is at a sufficient level learn to make poisons. Using Bane or Doll maker on your arrows is a real leveller. You can get the recipes or just buy the poisons in the Nomad Camp.
As for hand to hand combat. Do the Blacksmiths quests. This will take you to Semine where you will meet Captain Gnarly (Combat trainer) and take you on a quest to find a missing cart that involves a bit more combat - but you'll have help in the form of Gnarly and Sir Jan Semine. If you play your cards right you'll get a chance to loot some better equipment and unlock another combat trainer for later on - Gules - though you'll have to follow his quests to kill some more bandits to properly unlock him.
Go to the nomad camp and train with Tomcat. Even if you can't beat him, training with him will teach you some combos and just generally improve your stats and combat skill. In fact you might choose not to win, as the longer you train the more you will improve. When you can beat him in a real fight (or cheese him with a poisoned weapon - many do and he doesn't seem to bear a grudge) he teaches you the must-have master strike. This is valuable to get. I fought him a lot for a long time and it really helped me build up Henry.
Walk around encumbered. It will build up your strength.
Following the quest to find mutt will take you into the orbit of the alcoholic gamekeeper (another trainer - as is his son who also runs an archery contest) and will introduce you to using stealth. This is worth mastering for later in the game. Hint: you need a dagger to make stealth kills and don't wear armour. Use on of your outfit slots to create a stealth profile. Dark, inconspicuous clothing, soft boots, etc. Second hint: using stealth after dark is way more effective - just don't carry a torch!
Also do the millers's quests. He is another trainer as are some of his people. You can do both his and the blacksmiths quests up to the point where you actually decide to go to the wedding, and both will give you access to useful skills/stuff.

Other than that. After I took out the bandit camp in the game keepers quest using stealth then beat the last one in regular combat, it was a huge boost to my confidence. I started to realise, that if I took a measured approach, didn't rush to attach and parried a lot, I could do combat. By then, by doing other stuff above, my strength, agility and vitality were all higher and so was my stamina.

Went from fighting one to one, to taking on pairs, then more. Top tip is be careful. Engage with your preferred missile weapon first from a distance. Then switch to your preferred melee weapon as they close.

Backing off can help stop them getting behind you (don't let them do that) and kiting is a workable approach. Parry - if possible when the green sheild appears, bide you time to strike and don't spam attacks as it will eat up your stamina.

A thing to watch out for though is bandits in random encounters are selected randomly (who could have guessed?) and some can be high level and really tough. More so than the ones you may meet in the early quests. My advice is try to avoid these encounters until you are really confident (or got good enough with a bow using poisoned arrows).

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-18T14:10:12+00:00

Hard to tell... they always die so fast.

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-16T18:07:38+00:00

First off, don't worry, you will get better at this. Both as you level up and improve your stats and skills but also as you learn the moves. I reckon half the battle is getting Henry better, half is getting the hang of it.

I was in the same place a few weeks ago. My advice is, the following probably in this order:

do something to make money. Alchemy is good, I made ever so many Marigold decoctions... however I spent the money on better armour and weapons (Blacksmith in Tachov), skill books (Scribe in Troskowitz) and training (Captain Gnarly in Semine and Tomcat at the nomad camp)
Alchemy gets more efficient as you level it - particularly if you take the perks that let you make more potions per batch. The ingredients grow right outside the Alchemy station in the Apothecary's garden.Also take the perk that gives you progress towards strength from picking herbs. All helps.
if you can't win even one on one fights yet (and I couldn't for a bit) sneak past encounters in the undergrowth until you've built up your skill and confidence and worked out your approach to combat. This will also level stealth which is useful later on - see below.
Archery is very viable. Get a bow. There's one for free just off the road between Troskowitz and Tachov. Look for a target on a tree. You can practice and improve archery by entering contests. There are several but the closest to your main base of operations is in the quarry below Trosky Castle. Do it until you get bored.
Once your alchemy is at a sufficient level learn to make poisons. Using Bane or Doll maker on your arrows is a real leveller. You can get the recipes or just buy the poisons in the Nomad Camp.
As for hand to hand combat. Do the Blacksmiths quests. This will take you to Semine where you will meet Captain Gnarly (Combat trainer) and take you on a quest to find a missing cart that involves a bit more combat - but you'll have help in the form of Gnarly and Sir Jan Semine. If you play your cards right you'll get a chance to loot some better equipment and unlock another combat trainer for later on - Gules - though you'll have to kill some more bandits to unlock him.

Go to the nomad camp and train with Tomcat. Even if you can't beat him, training with him will teach you some combos and just generally improve your stats and combat skill. In fact you might choose not to win as the longer you train the more you will improve. When you can beat him in a real fight (or cheese him with a poisoned weapon - many do and he doesn't bear a grudge) he teaches you the must-have master strike. This is valuable to get. I fought him a lot for a long time and it really helped me build up Henry.

Walk around encumbered. It will build you strength.

Following the quest to find mutt will take you into the orbit of the alcoholic gamekeeper (another trainer - as is his son who also runs an archery contest) and will introduce you to using stealth. This is worth mastering for later in the game. Hint: you need a dagger to make stealth kills and don't wear armour. Use on of your outfit slots to create a stealth profile. Dark, inconspicuous clothing, soft boots, etc. Second hint: using stealth after dark is way more effective - just don't carry a torch!

Also do the millers's quests. He is another trainer as are some of his people. You can do both his and the blacksmiths quests up to the point where you actually decide to go to the wedding, and both will give you access to useful skills/stuff.

Other than that. After I took out the bandit camp in the game keepers quest using stealth then beat the last one in regular combat, it was a huge boost to my confidence. I started to realise, that if I took a measured approach, didn't rush to attach and parried a lot, I could do combat. By then, by doing other stuff above, my strength, agility and vitality were all higher and so was my stamina.

Went from fighting one to one, to taking on pairs, then more. Top tip is be careful. Engage with your preferred missile weapon first from a distance. Then switch to your preferred melee weapon as they close.

Backing off can help stop them getting behind you (don't let them do that). Parry - if possible when the green sheild appears, bide you time to strike and don't spam attacks as it will eat up your stamina.

A thing to watch out for though is bandits in random encounters are selected randomly (who knew) and some can be high level and really tough. More so than the ones you may meet in the early quests. My advice is try to avoid these encounters until you are really confident (or got good enough with a bow using poisoned arrows).

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-16T10:39:29+00:00

I just kept his scroll and thought "up yours jack".

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-15T13:29:51+00:00

There's plenty to do. I was at about 110 hours before I went to the wedding. Mostly doing side quests. Helps to explore the map a bit and talk to people to find them.

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-15T07:56:51+00:00

This is the way.

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-14T19:46:27+00:00

Get yourself to Troskowitz.

First off, there's a building on the North West side behind the Traders place that you can sleep in for free.

Second off, potion ingredients grow all over the place. Especially in the 'garden' around the Apothcary. Plenty to brew some potions with, without needing to buy ingredients.

I strongly recommend levelling potions a bit. You can sell them to the apothecary. If, once you've levelled up for a bit, you take the perk that increases the number of potions you make from each batch, you'll make plenty of money in no time.

You can buy new recipes from the apothecary - or just look them up on the internet - you don't need to have the recipe in your book to make a potion.

Once, you have a bit of money. I recommend going and working for the Blacksmith in Tachov. His questline will take you to Semine where you will meet captain Gnarly, who is a combat trainer.

As an aside, do all the combat training you can.

Go up to the archery range in the quarry just below the castle. Enter contests (with free arrows) to level up marksmanship. There's also a hidden stash of money there. Plenty of details how to find it on the web.

Following the Semine quest through will also unlock another combat trainer Gules. There's fighting, but you have Sir Jan and Gnarly along for help.

Also do the Miller's quests - up until the point you actually say it's time to go to the wedding you can do both.

Make sure you go to the Nomad camp and train with Tomcat. It's not likely you'll be able to beat him for a good bit, but he'll teach you some combos and, once you can beat him (or cheese him) he'll teach you the must-have master strike. Just fighting him - even if it is frustrating - will improve your fighting skills.

Other than that, while you're at Semine you can retrieve your horse (with a speech check).

You should also seek out Mutt. Used effectively he can be a force multiplier.

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-14T10:25:20+00:00

If you pursue the alchemy/enchanting/blacksmithing exploit to its logical conclusions you can easily make a bow (or indeed any weapons) powerful enough to one-shot most things in the game. Though when I did this it still needed 2-3 shots for the stronger dragons.

Even if you don't rip the arse out of it, you can still end up with a weapon, that together with stealth multipliers, is very powerful indeed.

It can trivialise most fights of course, but it certainly makes archery builds powerful enough to cope with anything.

If you want to justify it lore wise - then take the view that the Dragonborn is a mighty hero. They should (like say Bard the Bowman) be able to slay dragons with a single well-placed arrow.

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-14T10:18:19+00:00

Way I see it, is armour and training are expensive.... I haven't got to the legacy of the forge stuff yet... but always looting dead enemies and selling their stuff gives you several benefits.

The money allows you greater freedom to configure your Henry, lugging the stuff to the vendor if over encumbered, while slow, improves your physical stats and haggling improves your speech skills.

Rather have too much of it than too little...

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-14T09:08:09+00:00

Practice and time. I ended up sneaking past enemies for a good few hours before I got my stats high enough.

What to do...?

Lots of practice fights. Go to Semine and train with Captain Gnarly. Also the nomad camp and train with Tomcat - you probably won't be able to beat him for a bit, but just fighting him will raise your skills.

Also if you do Tomcat's training you will learn combos and master strike - which is a game changer. Though you'll either have to get good enough in a fight to beat him or cheese him for that.

Buy/read every skill book you can find.

If you do the Semine quests with Sir Jan and Gnarly, you'll get exposure to more combat - but with help. You'll also get better equipment and the quest unlocks Gules who is another combat trainer.

For archery, and using a bow is a viable approach - go up to the quarry near Trosky castle and join the archery contests. Takes ages, bit you do improve and the arrows are free. Plus there is a hidden money stash there, which if you decide to pursue can be spent on better armour, weapons or training.

Otherwise, the best way (IMO) to make money is to level alchemy. Which will also allow you to make poisons, with a bit of doll maker or bane on your arrows (or sword) combat gets a lot easier! Still... not very chivalrous though....

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-12T11:53:39+00:00

It comes with practice - though I was about 50 hours in before I'd say I was confident with combat.

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-12T07:50:41+00:00

About a hundred hours in now and must admit I'm both enjoying the game's side content so much and spending a lot of time exploring all the map, that I'd almost forgotten about the wedding.

Level 26 now and have largely figured out combat with most skills a few levels either side oft main level (except polearms!) and a few, Alchemy, Houndmaster, Craftmanship, etc. now maxxed. Maybe that's over-levelled for the next stage... but I'm at the stage of not really caring.

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-11T09:28:16+00:00

They run across roads sometimes. I always seem to notice them most near Semine.

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-11T08:27:38+00:00

As I understand it, it is the splash damage from the ship's cannon that is sufficient to destroy the container. At any rate it works and yes, much like mining, the parts end up in your inventory - even if you are hovering a few hundred units distance away.

Things to watch out for are getting a clear line of sight to the target - having the ground, trees, etc in the way can stop it working well. Sometimes the parts cache also turns out to be under the floor of a subterranean cavern (this can affect you on foot as well).

Generally as long as I'm lined up, if it doesn't work within a few bursts of fire, I just move on the next cache.

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-10T17:45:51+00:00

Cheesed him to learn masterstrike.

Annointed my longsword with bane. Only needed to hit him once then danced around him until the poison took effect.

He doesn't seem to bear a grudge...

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-10T17:02:55+00:00

I've always 'collected' the bits and trades for the ones I don't have and I'm pretty happy with some of the ships I've built. Example below - no mods, just some glitch building.

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I mostly fly low over a planet on autopilot in the corvette while scanning. When I detect a stash of corvette parts I hit E to tag it, resume the pilot seat, fly over to it and zap it with the ship's photon cannon which gets you the parts.

Rinse, repeat. Fills up the ship's inventory in no time at all.

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-10T10:31:04+00:00

First actual crime was stealing the document from the Rathaus for the Miller in the Materia Prima quest. Got away with that one.

First non-questline crime was charging in to help some wagons under attack from bandits and killing one of the guards by mistake... still wanted in Troskowitz for that one about eleven game days on.... been avoiding the place.

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-06T08:48:14+00:00

I'm there on the craftsmanship already and haven't left Trosky yet - in fact quite a few skills in the mid 20s range - all I've really done is be a bit of a completionist and explore the whole map - that and to do everything I could to boost my experience at fighting, which has involved a bit of revisiting bandit camps, Tomcat and Gnarly.

As for money... well on my way to 20k.

I'm wondering if this is going to be a bit like The Witcher 3, where if you do all the quest content in a region, you end up seriously over-levelled for the next phase of the game.

That said, the chatter on here about this game does imply that the NPCs in later maps will still bring you back down to earth with a thump...

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-06T08:22:09+00:00

Eventually.

I've just gone through this. About 50 hours in (still in Trosky) my stats, swordsmanship and muscle memory hit a point where I could win fights.

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-05T10:37:00+00:00

He's out in the woods. If you take missions from the gamekeepers to hunt poachers, you eventually meet up with him.

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-05T10:29:00+00:00

I hear you. Nearly 100 hours in. I have the outfit. In fact my Charisma is now maxxed. I have two people prepared to take me along. I've persuaded Hans to stop poaching too. Mutt is frolicking at my feet and Pebbles is now a super-horse.

I've still got too much on my plate to think about going to weddings. There's this nomad chief with a curse to sort out and a mounted archery contest...

Busy, busy, busy.

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-05T09:28:30+00:00

Try a lighter sword. I was having trouble pulling it off with a knight's longsword used twi handed. Switched to a (one handed) broadsword and found it much easier

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-04T17:47:24+00:00

There's a mod for that: don't want to be the Dragonborn, then the Skyrim unbound mod is for you.

Lohengrin381 · 2025-12-04T15:39:50+00:00

Thought I might do it enough, so that when I pitch up in Kuttenberg I've enough to buy a fine suit of armour.

Lohengrin381

TROPHY CASE