Honestly, a lot can be improved about AoD's combat system. A lot of design ideas have been implemented on top of each other that new mechanics make old ones shitty. Between fast attacks and aimed strikes to the legs, for instance, aiming for the legs is frequently a more appealing option since a good hit will cut an opponent down to size and let you stack penalties until he becomes a joke. Attribute synergies also have shit effects. For instance, 1 dex gives 3 daggers/swords/spears/dodge. If I'm going dodge+swords, 1 point of dex is worth more than 1 point of perception even if there were absolutely no AP bonus for dex. Stat synergies have caused this shit and imo should not exist as they encourage extreme min-maxing to fix your defense. The 10str-8dex-10con build for instance has a full fucking +30 block rating over a 4-10-4-10-8-4 crossbowman build just from its stats, for instance, and that's not counting the bonus block rating you get just for using shields and the extra block rating you get vs ranged weapons. Basic builds like dodge dagger assassin do not work due to how unreliable dodge is even outside of mobility penalties, aimed strikes to the legs, nets, and the extreme likelihood of getting crit for massive damage and losing DR due to the abysmal vsCrit and hardness on light armors. Dodge essentially assumes you have crafting and ideally alchemy too to make some kind of decent DR score with hardness and vsCrit behind it. I think hardness was honestly a mistake as was hammer denting. Originally heavy DR armors were supposed to be counterbalanced by their low defense score and the ability of power attacks to overcome them. Now it's countered by DR denting and aimed strikes horribly crippling you with ludicrous ease along with extreme crit now plowing you open. Incidentally, hardness denting seems like the kind of mechanic designed to make it more viable to damage heavily armored foes, yet ironically you have a much, much easier time denting light DR enemies in crap like leather than heavy armor users which have massive hardness scores. It's ass-backwards design even in terms of its intention. I also think crits shouldn't bypass damage reduction. It's brainless and stupidly powerful. I think crits should've been set up to make aimed strikes viable instead of letting everyone aimed strike out of the box in addition to improving crit rate and that crit skill should give you a bonus to your vsCrit and a minor bonus to THC. As it stands shields are the best way to avoid getting crit because a crafted armor with a crafted shield has a much better vsCrit than anything a dodge build can come up with. Dodge builds are resigned to getting crit for damage, esp. when you factor in their tendency to wear light armors. Axes and hammers both need a different weapon mastery effect and I think you should be able to collect a weapon mastery and crit on the same attack. For some reason, right now you can't, which makes crit swords awful (used to be good back when weapon mastery for swords was extra crit chance). Incidentally, the latest axe rework resulted in axe-wielding NPCs without proper crit, which is ridiculously bad, whereas previously axe and crit was the bad combination. I also think that antidotes shouldn't just lower the current poison intake but basically give you extra poison resist for a limited duration. Right now antidotes are fucking useless if you're liable to get poisoned all over again each turn. Just a bloody waste of precious APs. I also don't agree with the combat training you get for killing shit. Combat SP are already a reward for murder. If I'm making the Thief escape from Teron and I get to choose between killing everything and talking my way out of everything, it's a little silly that it's plainly more rewarding for me to go murder everything that moves just for the bonus combat training rewards that stack up there. I also think Liquid Fires need a rework since the way they provide damage bypassing DR on top of barriers to shoot behind makes ranged combat too easy. I can hole up in a corner and liquid fire the tile diagonally in front of me and only big spears will be able to melee me. Bolas I think should be more dependent on throwing and crit rate to be effective. Nets should be more demanding on your throwing skill too. I also think healers should be less expensive and that you shouldn't get to make healing medicine until at least 3 alchemy and that they should start with healing 5 or maybe 10 points. Atm healers are a straight waste of money. I only used them in my last playthrough because I had too much money to burn and to get the Maadoran healer quest, a sidequest players are liable to never discover if they just opt to use their own much cheaper alchemy heals like everyone recommends instead of her services. I also think you shouldn't have your starting SP divided into combat SP and social SP. It was a rather bad division from the start. I can understand getting combat SP from combat but dividing skill points the way the game does strongly suggests that you're supposed to hybrid towards both combat and noncombat which is a fucking terrible message to send newbies. Social skills like Crafting and Alchemy are also plainly more combat skills than social skills and Perception is also a combat stat despite giving social SP. Also the F1 tutorial is out of date giving incorrect explanations of mechanics, character creation shows the wrong critical rating for your character when you rank crit, and a number of subtler mechanical features (constitution's vsCrit effects and poison scaling aspects, str and per's bonuses to aimed strikes, dex's initiative score, armor AP limitations vs dex and the ability to raise the limits through crafting) have to be discovered rather than being explained to you during chargen. The combat tutorial is also shitty in terms of explaining how combat really works. The most it offers is a practice opportunity and some painfully basic advice like skilling your attack and defense skill. AoD lacks a proper manual on this shit too.
Overall there are too many ways to cheese enemies and a number of intuitive builds just don't work as well as they should. If you ask me maxing weapon+block+crafting would be my basic advice for newbies (along with using whetstones). You can't really lose that way.
The Great ThunThun: 
Sukhāvatī: 
Absinthe: 
rusty_shackleford: 
Axe Father: 
Fedora Master: 
BBMorti: 
Gregz: 
aweigh: 
