Oh, you think you've got some bad keyboard controls? I've been playing Lifeweb again this weekend, and holy fuck does that game not want to be played.
Combat is an incredibly messy, complicated affair where you need to select a specific bodypart on a paper doll (detailed to the point of: neck, head, face, right eye, left eye, chest, belly, groin etc.), select the appropriate hand, select the intent for that hand (such as grappling, disarming/pushing, or striking), then click on the enemy (or try to, at least. This is BYOND, so everything is choppy as a boatful of butchers in a hurricane). You should also remember to click on the button marked "combat", which will put you in combat mode making some actions default to attacking and also enabling your ability to dodge or parry, which isn't passively active.
Satisfied? Probably not, because in order to make full use of the combat system you'll need to use the special attacks. Special attacks are triggered by using the right mouse button when in combat mode, and is defined by your hand, your targeted bodypart, your intent, and also what you have selected from a drop-down menu on the edge of the screen. This can be anything from shaking your weapon threateningly (not doing anything), to making a feint, to performing a powerful strike that renders you extra vulnerable for 1-2 seconds.
But wait, there's more! There are also advanced attacks in addition to special attacks! These are chosen from a selective list of buttons located under your "intent" grid. These are things like kicking, biting, or attempting to blind your opponent (at least I think that's what it does), or wielding your weapon in both hands for more power. You select the button, select the target zone on the doll (which is on the other side of the screen from the combat controls, I might add), then press the middle mouse button. Yes, click in on the scroll wheel. Thankfully the wheelscrolling itself has no binding in the game.
Then you need to reselect the button if you want to do it again in some cases, because it likes to deselect itself. You don't need to click or select anything if you've successfully grasped your weapon in both hands, that stays passively active.
It's important to remember that damage to different bodyparts can result in different effects, and also locational armor is a thing and you can't target all parts with equal accuracy or ability (trying to grab someone's foot while they're standing up is unlikely to be successful), and also remember that there are special interactions like using the "kick" advanced attack targeting the groin of an enemy male will have a special effect resulting in an almost guaranteed knockdown and stun, and that using "grab" on an enemy's mouth will stifle their screams for help. Disarming generally only works if you target the hand that the opponent is wielding something in.
Did I mention that there are no hotkeys for any of this? Or that you can't rebind anything? Yeah.
It would seem that for Russians, adversity isn't merely a fact of life... It's an art form. Books that don't want to be read, music that doesn't want to be listened to and now video games that don't want to be played.