Combo not going any higher than 1, trying to make combat system (roblox)

I’m trying to make a combat system and obviously need a combo variable to keep track of what current combo i am in

game.ReplicatedStorage.Remotes.M1.OnServerEvent:Connect(function(player, Mouse)
    print("Received M1 from the Client")
    local combo = 0
    local startTime = tick()

    if combo == 3 then
        print("M1 Combo!")
        combo = 0
    end

    if tick() - startTime >= 2 then
        combo = 0
    end

    combo = combo + 1
    print(combo)
end)

But it just seems to never go higher than 1 or never add 1 to the combo

I’ve tried adding print debugs to the scripts (as seen under combo = combo + 1), but none of those really helped, any help would be appreciated!

combo is declared as a local variable inside the event handler, so every time it receives an event, it starts combo at 0. Instead, combo and startTime should be declared outside of the function.

Some other small things are that tick() will be deprecated soon so os.time() should be used instead. Additionally, combo = combo + 1 can be shortened to combo += 1, and game:GetService("{serviceName}") is recommended over game.{serviceName}. Below, lastHit is used instead of startTime since it tracks the time of the last hit.

The script after all these fixes:

local combo = 0
local lastHit = os.time()

game:GetService("ReplicatedStorage").Remotes.M1.OnServerEvent:Connect(function(player, Mouse)
    print("Received M1 from the Client")
    combo += 1

    if os.time() - lastHit >= 2 then
        combo = 0
    end

    lastHit = os.time()

    if combo == 3 then
        print("M1 Combo!")
        combo = 0
    end

    print(combo)
end)