2. Slightly decreasing downstab's rangeThe problem is that you don't know if the "ghost range" is actually a bug or only the result of the range variable itself (on the code).
Without that information, i just can't agree with decreasing downstab's range, you should remove this until you know.
Other than that, i found the actual system good enough not to be changed until we know more on what i said before, thats why :
"In ranging battle downstab usually wins against upstab" Upstab is widely used as the main range stab for a good reason, and second the difference is so short that it doesn't really make sense, upstab or downstab its about factors like angle,timing per exemple that really make the difference and I'm fairly sure thats what the devs wanted, a system where you can actually win range with either Down or Up stab still with a little advantage to upstab.
So the "in ranging battle the downstab usually win" argument doesn't work for me.
Is the Ghost Range always happenning ? i don't think so, it must be a thing that happens sometime, in short : a bug, not directly the downstab range you know. If true it would not be smart then to decrease the range of downstabs, that could unbalance the actual melee, you will tell me downstab is already dominating but only in
close and mid range, if you decrease the range, even slightly it would be even more difficult than it is today to feint at long distance and make the upstab dominating in mid range.
In fact its already viable to rely a lot on mid-range upstab for people that have good footwork, so make change slightly could make it more than viable. Frankly if that happen it will make the melee slower, because the upstab is slower and often used by cancer players to not get chambered easily, also making melee slower and upstab better also helps those that rely on blocks only.
Also remember a key thing, "stab range only matters at long distance"
Whatever the range is, on nw as long as one of the weapons is faster, physically, starting from a x position it will impact the first against a more ranged one. So if you dislike the downstab domination (as a regular mid-close stab, not as a range stab), like the reverse stab on native, you need to decrease it speed, but do we want to decrease it speed ? it has created a good, variant and well known meta.
You can't reduce speed without making napoleonic war melee more casual and simple, it's already mocked by native players, no need to make it worse
I recommend you not going any further about "decreasing downstab's range" until you know more of the code.
"Though there seems to be slight disparity between animation of downstab and it's actual range, so-called ghost range." That is true, but like i said we need to know more about what cause that.
I'd say what downstab need is an animation fix for the Ghost-Range problem that i believe is a bug that need conditions to occur (not related to the stab range), more accuracy (that fit with animation) is welcome the rest doesn't seem neccessary.
1. Fixing pokesWhy not, seems good, but lets making it clear
that we prefer poke to be more logical and realist than totally removed if possible, a lot of people dislike poke but we all love the game mechanics of NW and Warband, the mechanics are the soul of the game (at least most of it, you know, the directional melee we like it, challenging skills ect...), but the Warband Physic its like Einstein theory of relativity, it has predicted pokes to exist, like Black Hole, it is normal for pokes to exist in a logical melee system where the faster and stronger your stab impact the more damage it does the slower and weaker it impact the less damage it does than can go as much as no damage so then poke (on the paper...), removing pokes would be a bit of treason to the original warband soul, so lets not remove it if we can find a better solution for poke to be more realistic so then
fair.
This was more for others people than you herishey.
Remove chambers.
You do that, you make hokej not far from being godlike in being a inviolable blocking machine.