1. Fixing pokes
No-one knows for sure if anything can be done with pokes. Problem is they are very random and can easily turn around the fight. Ideally goal is to stabilize pokes, like they are mostly in Native, but sadly most realistic option is to completely remove them which isn't that great but it might be still better than having random pokes.
Unblockable feint spam incoming. You just w them down and shrek them into fast stab kick combo or ppl just spam
3. Less tanky units
There are multiple ways of making that happen. Either make units have less health and proportionally decrease damage on ranged weapons so there is no difference regarding ranged damage OR increase damage on all melee weapons. Reason for this change is that stabs often do random damage and player can tank 5 stabs and then kills you in one stab. Of course it is known which stabs usually will do a lot of damage (long range stabs, moving forward) and which less (close range stabs, moving backwards), but there is still a lot of random moments like stabs that should kill but don't (upstab in the head from the medium range) and stabs that kill and shouldn't (downstab in the legs from maximum range while moving backwards). Of course unit's should be able to get killed to fast since getting killed with one blockchamber that can't be defended against is not fair. Idea is to decrease tankyness for about 25%.
stabs dont deal random dmg
1. they deal at the moment you hit so kinda like (fast) poke -> low dmg -> high dmg -> low dmg -> poke (slow)
2. if u press w
3. hold
4. enemy movement
5. armor (and which armor part you hit)
whole melee needs revamp stun chambers are too punishing so everyone too afraid to attack
2. Slightly decreasing downstab's range
There are two reasons for that. Until September 2012 upstab and downstab had same range and same speed, than there was a patch that made upstab longer and downstab faster, I imagine that animations were adjusted to the changes. Though there seems to be slight disparity between animation of downstab and it's actual range, so-called ghost range. Second reason is that downstab seems to be a bit overpowered. Downstab spam with addition of backpedaling is very annoying to deal with and quite easy to perform (though I'm not saying it takes no skill). In ranging battle downstab usually wins against upstab because speed buff was greater than upstab's lenght buff. If the range on downstab is decreased it will still stay dominant stab as it's higher speed makes chambers harder to react to. How much downstab's range should be decreased? Maybe only to fit the animation and lose it's ghost range.
ppl just miss their up attacks?