The thing about kcd1 combat is you are heavily incentivized to fight defensively. Its cool you have 5 directions to attack from, but when anyone other than the weakest enemies dressed in rags can and will master strike you, why even attack? I mostly just master strike my way through enemies.  Im hoping kcd2 makes offensive fighting a little more viable even if it removes some of the complexity that I miss out on anyways in kcd1.