If you're trying to write a roblox combat system script for your game, you've likely realized that making a punch feel "heavy" is way harder than it looks. It isn't just about subtracting ten health from a humanoid when a button is clicked; it's about timing, animations, and making sure the server doesn't have a meltdown when five players start brawling at once. Honestly, combat is the backbone of most successful games on the platform, so getting this right is worth the headache.
When I first started messing around with combat scripts, I thought I could just use a simple .Touched event on a sword or a fist and call it a day. Boy, was I wrong. Using .Touched for a fast-paced fighting game is a recipe for frustration because it's notoriously unreliable. You'll find that sometimes hits don't register at all, and other times they register twice. If you want something that actually feels professional, you have to dig a bit deeper into how Roblox handles physics and communication between the player and the server.
The foundation of animations
Before you even touch a line of code for damage, you need to think about your animations. A roblox combat system script is only as good as the motion it's triggering. If the animation is sluggish, the combat will feel floaty. If it's too fast, players won't be able to react.
I've found that the "anticipation" phase of an animation is everything. This is that split second where the character pulls their arm back before swinging. In your script, you'll want to use AnimationTrack:GetMarkerReachedSignal if you want to be precise. This allows you to trigger the actual "damage" part of your code exactly when the fist or weapon is at its furthest point in the swing. It makes the hit feel connected to the visual, rather than just happening randomly while the arm is moving.
Also, don't forget to use different animations for a "combo" system. Nobody wants to see the exact same right-hook five times in a row. You can set up a simple counter variable in your script that resets every few seconds, allowing the player to cycle through a left jab, a right jab, and then maybe a heavy kick.
Handling hit detection the right way
Like I mentioned earlier, .Touched is usually a bad idea for serious combat. So, what should you use instead? Most high-end developers lean toward Raycasting or Magnitude checks.
Raycasting is great because it's incredibly precise. Basically, you're drawing an invisible line from the player's hand to a point a few studs in front of them. If that line hits another player's hitbox, boom—you've got a hit. The "Raycast Hitbox" modules you see in the devforum are popular for a reason; they handle all the math for you and let you attach hitboxes to specific parts of a weapon.
If you're making something a bit more casual or "AOE" (Area of Effect) style, Magnitude is your best friend. It's a simple distance check. You basically ask the script, "Is Player B within 5 studs of Player A?" It's very light on performance, though it doesn't care about which way the player is facing, so you might need to add a "Dot Product" check if you want to make sure they're actually aiming at their opponent.
Client vs. Server: The big battle
This is where most beginners get stuck. You can't just put your entire roblox combat system script in a LocalScript. If you do, only the player swinging will see the damage, and the rest of the server will just see people waving their arms at each other. On the flip side, you can't put everything on the server, or there will be a tiny delay (latency) between when a player clicks and when the animation starts, which feels terrible.
The "Golden Rule" is usually this: 1. The Client (LocalScript) handles the input and the immediate visual feedback (playing the animation locally). 2. The Server (Script) handles the math, the health subtraction, and the security checks.
You'll use RemoteEvents to bridge the gap. When a player clicks, the LocalScript tells the server, "Hey, I'm trying to punch!" The server then checks if the player is actually allowed to punch (are they stunned? is their cooldown over?) and then tells everyone else to see the damage.
But be careful—don't let the client tell the server how much damage to do. An exploiter could easily change that "10 damage" to "999,999 damage" and ruin your game in seconds. Always keep your damage values safely tucked away in a Server Script or a ModuleScript that the client can't touch.
Adding the juice
If you've got the hits registering and the health dropping, you've got a functional script, but it probably feels a bit "stiff." This is where "juice" comes in. Juice is all the little extra stuff that makes the combat satisfying.
First, think about Hitstop. This is a tiny, almost unnoticeable pause in the animation when a hit connects. It mimics the resistance of hitting a physical object. Even a 0.05-second pause can make a huge difference.
Next, you need sound effects and particles. A dull "thud" for a hit and a little puff of dust or a blood effect (if that's your game's vibe) goes a long way. You can trigger these from the server so everyone sees and hears them.
Lastly, consider Camera Shake. Don't overdo it—nobody wants to get motion sickness—but a slight jolt of the camera when a heavy attack lands makes the player feel powerful. There are plenty of open-source camera shake modules that are super easy to plug into your existing system.
Performance and Lag
If your game is going to have 30 people fighting in a small arena, performance becomes your biggest enemy. Every time you run a Raycast or a distance check, the server has to do work.
To keep things smooth, make sure you aren't running hit checks every single frame if you don't have to. Also, cleaning up your effects is vital. If your combat script spawns "hit particles" but never deletes them, the game will start to lag after ten minutes of fighting. Use the Debris service to automatically clean up those parts and sounds after they're finished.
Another trick is to "interpolate" or smooth out the movement of players. If someone has a high ping, they might appear to teleport around, making them impossible to hit. Implementing a small bit of client-side prediction can help, though that's getting into more advanced territory. For your first script, just focus on making sure the server isn't doing unnecessary calculations.
Final thoughts on building your system
Writing a roblox combat system script is honestly a rite of passage for any Roblox dev. It's frustrating when the hitboxes don't align or when a RemoteEvent refuses to fire, but seeing it all come together is the best feeling.
Don't try to build the next Blox Fruits or Battlegrounds system on your first day. Start with a single punch that does damage to a dummy. Once that works, add a combo. Once that works, add a block mechanic. It's all about layering these small systems on top of each other until you have something that feels fun to play.
And hey, don't be afraid to look at how other people do it. The Roblox developer community is huge, and there are tons of open-source projects where you can peek at the code to see how they handled things like knockback or stuns. Just make sure you understand why the code works before you copy-paste it into your own game. Happy scripting!