I'm often attacking someone else by the time of an execution notification. Even worse they often die by poison, heat aura, bleeding, etc before I get back to them.

(BTW I haven't had this much fun with a game in years. Thanks.)

For what it's worth, I wouldn't like executions to be automatic. They would turn into a generic status effect then, and this game has a lot of them already.

I went into some detail into my thoughts on executions long ago in a suggestion thread:

https://neocoregames.com/en/community/hub/suggestions-from-small-tweaks-to-large-features

To sum up, I'd rather have the choice of long (extended animation) executions and normal (current) executions, with a bonus on the benefits for the first type, and both being manually triggered. They could be selected with different keys (e.g. "F" a nd "G" respectively). By adding a cooldown to the long executions, part of the fun would be to pick the right time for each type.

Having a "bullet time" or similar effect for executions as Berff says is also a great idea. This could be associated to a perk or a passive trait deep in the Execution Tree.

Of course, this is going in the opposite direction, but I don't find always optimizing for speed fun, and executions are an optional gameplay element anyway. But we agree in that they could use a boost, cosmetic or otherwise.

The long executions could also be gated by an optional (side path) trait in the Execution Tree. That would make it simpler (both triggered by "F" key) and entirely optional.

Another improvement to the Execution Tree would be a trait to allow executions to happen with more enemy types than they currently do (e.g. Ogryns).

(Sorry for the bump, but somehow I can't edit my previous message).