Wide spread of mob targeting

Ever since we've had the directional targeting in the game, we've been able to hit more than one target at once. In general, I think this is a nice thing that allows interesting elements in gameplay; for example, as you can hit a large number of small swarming spiders, or you can lob fire at a small group of enemies.

However, it is frustrating in points because you can hit things unintentionally. I know -- don't you want to hit as many thing as possible? No, not always. So, for instance, just from an role-players perspective, if I come across a wolf that's attacking a stag, I might want to save the stag from the wolf... But I have to be extremely careful on how I position myself, or else I'll hit the stag, too. Then the stag will attack me ! There are also potentially non RP examples where you might not want to hit certain targets.

Now, if this was all realistic, in that you should expect to hit something when you're in a certain position, it wouldn't really be anything to complain about. It would be a natural tactical challenge to position yourself right in combat. However, this tends to be extremely unrealistic. So, if I'm facing the wolf directly, I'll still hit the deer. And if I'm fighting two bandits, where one is right behind the other, I'm going to hit the bandit behind the first, even though that would make no sense in real life.

This is just something I hope for @Chris to think about. Multi-target is good, but at the same time, if the game was a bit more discrete in certain instances, or at least allowed me to be more discrete, I think it would work better.

 

Agreed, it would be nice if you had a "cleave" option, or stance that could be toggled. In that, you could go into a melee "stance" that would hit singly targeted opponents only. Whatever the method would be though, should not complicate the game even further, but be integrated naturally into the melee skills sets...

 

it doesnt feel directional any more, half the time target next mob seems to select something behind me and i waste my time trying to work out where in hell the mob is Ive targetted