Features

Gothic Free Aim offers more than just free aiming and comes with a number of associated sub-features. They are listed here and are explained in how exactly they change the game mechanics.
It is not elaborated upon the vast configuration options of each feature. You can read more about it here.

List of Features

• Free aiming
  • Free aiming for ranged combat
  • Free aiming for spells
• Re-usable projectiles
• Custom collisions
• Critical hits

The features are highly configurable and can be individually enabled or disabled. You can find more in-depth information here.

---

Free Aiming

The core mechanics allows free mouse movement while aiming and shooting in the direction of a displayed reticle with both Gothic-1-controls and Gothic-2-controls. While doing so it is possible for the player to move (in eight directions).

By default, free aiming can be disabled in the game menu at any time. When disabled, Gothic's normal auto aiming takes effect again. This also enables players that prefer to play with keyboard only to keep playing without using free aiming.

Ranged Combat

Free aiming in ranged combat works for both Gothic-1-controls and Gothic-2-controls. With the former, the action key is pressed and held to aim and the forward key is used to shoot (as is default). With the latter (only available in Gothic 2), the parade key is pressed and held to aim and the action key is used to shoot, usually this comes down to the right and left mouse buttons. Based on these key bindings, it is not possible to move forwards while aiming when using the Gothic 1 controls.
The active control scheme (Gothic 1 controls/Gothic 2 controls) for ranged free aiming can be set by the player independent from the global control scheme via settings in the Gothic.ini-file.

Free aiming for ranged weapons includes the most sub-features. Here is an unsorted list.

• Varying projectile gravity and damage
  The time the bow has been drawn affects the gravity and damage of the shot. The shorter the draw time, the faster is the drop of the arrow and the less damage it makes.
  Since crossbows are mechanical, the gravity and damage are not determined by draw time, but by how long the crossbow has been held steadily without movement. The less time since the last mouse movement the faster is the drop of the bolt and the less damage it makes. These effects are indicated by the reticle.
• Varying weapon recoil
  Since crossbows are mechanical, they exhibit a recoil (camera movement upwards at time of shooting). The less strength the player has, the higher is the recoil; with more strength the recoil becomes less impactful.
• Hit chance by scattering
  Instead of the default Gothic hit chance, by which only a fraction of shots are registered on the target, the hit chance is implemented by scattering the shots. This accuracy is scaled with the weapon hit chance in Gothic 2 and with dexterity in Gothic 1, where a value 100 corresponds to 100% accuracy, which is 0% scattering of shots.

These sub-features are highly customizable. The above details show the example configuration that is set by default.

Spells

Free aiming with spells allows casting a spells in any direction the reticle is pointing into. Spells travel directly towards the reticle without gravity or varying accuracy (like it is found in free aiming for ranged weapons). While aiming or investing a spell, the player is free to move.

Free aiming with spells works for both Gothic-1-controls and Gothic-2-controls. With the former, the action key is pressed and held to aim and the forward key is used to shoot (as is default). With the later (only available in Gothic 2), the reticle is shown continuously and the action key is used to shoot. Based on these key bindings, it is not possible to move forwards while aiming when using the Gothic 1 controls. Because there is no segregation of aiming and shooting with the Gothic 2 controls, there, this "aim movement" is active while investing or casting a spell allowing to cast spells while continuing to walk backwards (or any other direction).
The active control scheme (Gothic 1 controls/Gothic 2 controls) for spells can be set by the player independent from the global control scheme via settings in the Gothic.ini-file.

Not all spells allow free aiming and hence the display of a reticle and moving while investing or casting. Only spells that affect a focus, but do not require a focus to be cast, support free aiming. Sleep, for example, requires a focus and thus is not supported. Similarly summoning spells, teleport spells, healing spells, light spells and area of effect spells are not supported; yet they allow free movement while investing or casting. Otherwise their mechanics remain largely untouched. However, spells like fireball, destroy undead, ice block and a wide range of other spells use free aiming. For more information read on here.

There are close to no further customization options for free aiming with spells, aside from reticle adjustments.

Re-usable Projectiles

In both Gothic 1 and Gothic 2, arrows and bolts vanish upon hitting a surface by default. Here, however, whether they get stuck in wooden surfaces or bounce off of stone, they remain in the world and can be collected and reused. Additionally, the can be retrieved from the inventories of shot NPCs.

The details of this feature are customizable, e.g. conditions under which a projectile is collectable or it may be replaced by a "used" or broken projectile.

Note that this feature requires re-balancing the amount of projectiles present in the world. By default, there would be too many, as a large number can be re-used. More information and a script that re-balances this easily is provided here.

Custom Collisions

In Gothic 1 arrows and bolts always vanish on impact. In Gothic 2 they additionally bounce off of certain surfaces or may get stuck in wooden surfaces. This feature implements this behavior for Gothic 1, alongside collision sounds. For Gothic 2, this feature provides an important fix for too long range shots on AI.

The real power of the feature (for both Gothic 1 and Gothic 2), however, lies in its customization. It is possible to design collision rules by surface material and texture and to alter hit registration on NPCs.

Critical Hits

In Gothic 1 critical hits in ranged combat are scaled with the weapon talent, whereas there are no critical hits for ranged combat in Gothic 2 at all by default.

With the ability of free aiming and this feature, it is possible to change the damage output depending on the body part that was hit. Furthermore, this feature allows to define the damage behavior of projectiles. With this it is, for example, possible to design arrows that cause a one-shot knockout or one-shot kill.
In its default configuration, this feature gives a damage multiplier for head shots:
In Gothic 2, a critical hit only depends on hitting the head, whereas in Gothic 1 critical hits have to be learned first (weapon skill). For skill level 0, there are no critical hits, for skill level 1 only 50% of the positive head shots are registered as critical hits, and for skill level 2 all head shots are considered critical hits (as in Gothic 2). This is to keep the incentive to learn the ranged weapon skills in Gothic 1.

The body parts for critical hits can be individually configured for all NPCs.