Q:
When do melee weapons hit multiple targets?
The multiple target hit is very life like, but hard to plan on.
Melee hit’s will automaticly face the target you are attacking. If the attack is e.g. a swing, and in the swing path is another enemy you hit that one too (mostly with lesser damage and never crit).
So predicting it is really really hard. Just see it as a small bonus.
Arise, opressed of Tyria!
Basically, if the attack is a sweep, with a reasonably sized weapon (so basically everything but dagger) it will be AoE.
Some chains that have sweeps in them end with a stab however (warrior sword, mesmer sword, guardian sword sort of, might be more) that will only hit 1 target.
I’ve seen it happen occasionally with dagger, too, on a Thief. Just not reliably. That’s why I was asking, actually, because I was trying to figure out what I did right the times that it hit more than one target.
I got the same impression you did, gimme, that the ones that are animated as sweeping gestures are more likely to, that the ones that say “stab” can’t. My first thought was that it was based on facing, but I’d swear that at least once or twice I’ve seen it hit targets that were pretty far apart. On the other hand, that could be client-server sync problems; maybe the server didn’t think the mobs were where my client showed them.