So, Im about 10 hours into Final Fantasy XV, and I'm enjoying it immensely, but one thing I can not figure out is the combo system. The tutorial went over some of the basics of combat just fine - Warp points, blindsides, etc. but when it came to weapon combos, I'm pretty sure it just said "eh whatever just try moving the stick in different directions"...or something equivalent to that.

Flash forward to now, and I've been training for a good hour or so trying to suss out moves, but it feels like whatever I do, the move that comes out is pretty random. Thus far I've been sticking to greatswords because 1.) That's always been my thing in RPGs and 2.) It seems like the weapon I have the most control over, but past that I can never seem to reproduce moves I pull off.

Can somebody help a duder out?

Pretty much just hold down the circle button and if you press the direction towards the mob at far range you'll get one chain, at close range you get another chain, and you get a side chain if you press either side, and another if you press back. It's easiest to see with the spears.

For combos you can do stuff like get up on the mob while it's facing away, then when it goes to hit you, you can hit back to do a dodge hit then jump back into it. You can switch on the fly to a royal arm to get more damage, a different weapon that is more suited to the specific enemy, or a faster weapon if you need to dodge stuff.

Eventually you're going to end up taking years to kill anything if you use only the greatsword, certain mobs are weak to certain weapons and later on it's pretty rough to try and fight something with the wrong kind of weapon. Not to say that you shouldn't use the less efficient weapon damage-wise for some mobs, sometimes a big hit over the head with a big sword will knock them down or an aerial attack with a spear will let you force a bird to the ground (actually a greatsword seems kinda useless against birds now that I think of it). The depth of FFXV's combat comes from the variety of different weapons, moves, and spells you have at your disposal and while no two players will use the same approach you will see using a variety of different attacks pay dividends.

So I've spent a fair bit of time researching all the attacks you can do with the various weapon classes in preparation for a weapon guide series and combat tutorial series for Youtube, so for now I have a text document you can refer to if you'd like. The gist of it is that holding the stick in various directions and holding or tapping the attack button (which is occasionally different in function) is how you pull off your moves. The key thing to note is that inputs are relative to the line drawn between Noctis and his target. There's no physical line so you kind of have to visualize what angle the line is at, which is why pulling off the correct move is a little unintuitive.

I spent probably 20 minutes in training trying to figure out how to do a move I'd heard about with swords where you do a side attack and then warp into the air, only to realize that the only secondary resource I had was wrong on the input: the resource said the input was "hold side+O then let go after the hit". The actual input was "hold side+O to get the first hit then hold diagonal-up+O" and because that move makes Noctis move in a semi-circle, it just worked out for the guy.

Greatswords are pretty useful through the entire game, but like Belegorm said, it's usually best to stick to what weapons the enemies are weak to (you can see when/if Ignis successfully casts Libra on them, or if you scan them in Wait Mode). I personally don't like greatswords all that much if I can't annihilate the enemy in one or two swings because I tend to get hit a lot with them. I stick to the forward+O combo a lot of the time, and the O (pause) O attack.

I'll try to have those weapon guide videos up soon, but they take a fair bit of time to make. I've got the sword one mostly done, and polearm one about halfway done.

From what I've played, trying to master the directional attack stuff is just a waste of time and it doesn't do much for you other than needlessly complicate combat. It's far more important to pair weapons to enemy weaknesses and then to circle around and try to get blindside hits to launch link-strikes or to block and counter when the prompts come up.

Here are excerpts from the official collector's edition guide on combat:

• AutomaticCombos: You can perform fluid combos by holding O/B. This leads to an automatic series of attacks aimed at the currently selected target and concludes with a powerful blow. Note that you can perform directional attacks after the first hit of a combo by tilting L(stick) while pressing or holding the attack button. Each weapon category has access to different directional attacks. For example, greatswords unleash a devastating charged blow if you hold (and eventually release) the attack button while tilting the stick away from your target.
• Finishers:If at any point you stop in the middle of a combo, even after a single attack, there is a brief window during which you may perform a Finisher- a special attack that can have special properties. Simply release O/B, then press it again during the finisher "window". With most weapons, a Finisher opportunity is indicated by a clear visual cue: Noctis taking a step backwards. For (one handed)swords, you need to press the button(O/B) when Noctis extends his right arm outward, just as the sword begins to disappear.
• Aerial Combos: Combos performed while Noctis is airborne enable him to maintain his position until the attack sequence is complete, which is often essential against flying targets or essential body parts on giant opponents. The most convenient way to initiate these is usually to acquire target lock and then use a warp strike. Once Noctis has unlocked certain abilities on his Ascension tree, aerial combos can be extended by tilting L(stick) in any direction.

Most of the directional attacks seem to rely mostly on tilting towards the target(which, in general, is a faster combo), tilting away from the target( generally backstep combos, or charge moves), and some weapons have sideways directional moves. Polearms sideways attacks are sweeping attacks, firearms have a dive-shot, and daggers do a sidestep, which if you continue to hold down, Noctis will just keep sidestepping circles around the target. If you get the timing down, it becomes pretty easy to get blindsides on normal sized enemies.

The greatsword finisher is really useful, it is a huge AOE spin attack, and does good damage. The greatsword charge attack(tilt away from target while holding O/B), will have Noctis flash purple when fully charged. Air combos seem to be the most useful with one handed swords, polearms ,and daggers. Greatswords seem to hit once and then you fall out of the air combo. If you unlock Death Drop, you can just jump, then air warp strike into an air combo, which is dope.

I'm on the other side of the fence on this one. The game was obviously intentionally designed and balanced so that you never need to know anything in the combat system besides what you said, but I feel that saying mastering the intricacies of the combat is a waste of time is selling short the interesting gameplay that the existence of said intricacies brings. My comparison would be to the Devil May Cry games: you can totally "square-square-triangle" your way through that series as long as you're really good about knowing when and how to dodge stuff. Even still, people make combo videos of DMC because it's fun to engage with the depth.

Obviously FFXV doesn't have that kind of depth, but what you can do in this game's system is make interesting decisions and challenge yourself. I personally only carry like 2 phoenix downs and some potions on me because my goal is to make it through fights without getting hit, so phoenix downs are there only if I screw up real bad (or I need my team), and potions are for keeping Ignis alive so he can heal my dudes or for when I'm using Royal Arms. For example, if I'm engaging a squad of magitek soldiers with a sword, it's like a pub brawl. I'm wailing away on some robot and I see that other robots are coming at me, so I have a couple decisions: I can backflip away to disengage and avoid the risk of getting smoked at the expense of DPS, I can forward attack to reset my animation and be able to guard mid-combo, or I can side attack and use the space I create to be able to continue wailing on the first robot and simultaneously avoid damage. Combat systems like DMC, FFXV and tons of other action/action-rpgs have a scalable interactivity that I really appreciate.