I feel like it could use an attack speed buff, I think it is unreasonably slow considering it’s a 1h weapon and doesn’t particularly look that unwieldy. Another thing they could do is buff its’ infantry damage by a significant margin, maybe make it blend chaff, maulers and berserkers easily? I feel like the anti-armour capabilities of it are decent enough, and it has excellent dodge.
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My feelings exactly. Its damage is perfect as-is vs. armor, but it suffers horribly vs. hordes.
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This is all wrong. Also, A+F is not that Overpowered. It’s definitely a strong weapon. However, Bill Hook outperforms it in almost every way with a decent headshot ratio. I agree that Axe and Falchion individually are bad. Axe is bad on Dwarf as well. A+F has the mobility of a 2H weapon now. It has good damage. You could argue it is slightly overtuned, but saying it’s OP because it’s better than two of the most useless weapons in the game doesn’t really add up.
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Disagree with you statement on axes with Bardin. Its the highest damage dealer the Dwarf has, and as such is great on Slayer builds (I run dual hammer/1h axe build myself, the former for crowds, the latter for elites). You can also arguably use it in a RV build paired with the Grudgeraker (again, ax for elites, Grudgeraker for hordes).
Outside of Bardin I can agree with you somewhat. 1h Axe on Kerellian is a classic “Solution Without a Problem” ( and thus why I never see anyone using it), and 1h Axe on Saltzpyre is currently outclassed by A&F combo (though those without DLCs might still find use with it).
It does less damage in every situation as compared to running dual axes + Dual Hammers or Quad Axes. It also does less armor damage than 2H Axe or 2H Hammer or Pick. It does considerably less monster damage than dual axes. Also, with dual axes you can q swap heavy 1 which gives you 100% uptime on grimnir. It is serviceable on slayer, but it underperforms as compared to many of his other options. A weapon with zero multi - target hits should be doing considerable single target damage. It does not.
Yeah, maybe. I’ve messed with it some. The thp regen is just so bad and RV doesn’t have smiter so it’s armor damage is always gonna suck in melee, but that’s a whole different problem.
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I play on console, so my patches are somewhat behind PC, but at the patch level I’m at dual axes definitely do not do more damage than the 1h axe (nor does Greataxe for that matter). If that changed recently let me know but from what I see and experience, 1h axe is still the biggest damage dealer.
The only reason I see people running quad axes is to stack them to specifically target enemy types (a +Chaos set/+Whatever and a +Skaven/+Whatever set).
2H Hammers are a completely different creature with a completely different playstyle. Same for Pick.
I’ve never played console, but the reason that you run quad axe is to q swap heavy 1. You can cancel the animation after your second axe hits. It does really solid damage. Can do the same thing with Dual Hammers.
Out of curiosity, how are you even testing dps on console? Are you using the calculator?
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Test dummies in the keep. Crude, but it gets by.
I have to take all online tables/spreadsheets/builds/advice/etc with a grain of salt since console is behind on patches and sometimes differs from PC for hardware reasons, (i.e. the “less rats but more hitpoints” difference). In general, its pretty close though, discounting all the Ranged issues (which is why I never comment on any ranged combat issues).
You can edit the calculator to input specific information if you need to. That’s what I would use to test a lot of stuff if I were you. Otherwise, it’s hard to find accurate information on console I would think.
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I’m not sure why you especially quoted that part because your follow-up text has nothing to do with it and no it isn’t wrong. You do balance tests regularly yourself, so you know where you can check the values. The comparison with Axe and Falchion is obviously because of the combination. But my point is that even after bringing up those weapons to average the A&F still outperforms them by far. And the comparison of it being an overpowered weapon is after comparison with the whole melee arsenal of all characters.
Axe&Falchion is the 7th fastest weapon in the game with the above six weapons having lower base damage and in most cases lower or similar cleave.
There are only six weapons which have an attack with a higher base damage than the Axe&Falchion. ALL considerably slower by a significant margin.
It is in the top 20 % in both categories. It has cleave and speed on the Falchion hits and it has high and fast armor damage on the axe strikes. It has three stamina shields and three dodges (maybe 2 can’t remember exactly) and dodge bonus of 10 %. This is ABOVE the average for 2h weapons which are the only ones which come close to its damage profile. Most two hand weapons have either 0 % dodge bonus and/or just two dodges.
Axe&Falchion has the highest single infantry damage in the whole game. So where is the weakness that justifies this over the top stats?
Hordes? No, it can easily dispatch a horde.
Armor? No, it has one of the highest and easiest anti-armor combo with all hits doing armor damage (in contrast to something like Rapier or Dual Daggers).
Mixed Hordes? No, because the same attack works against everything.
Defense? No, with three stamina shields and the more than sufficient dodge values you can kill very safely. In worst case you have to use the (again very fast) push attack which has a linesman modifier, a good push and a 20 % crit chance to activate Swift Slaying.
I won’t argue that the Billhook might even be more bonkers but at least it needs some finesse to be used. But both weapons have effectively no weakness and stats far above average. That is the definition of overpowered.
Exactly… A&F shines only in its work: pure DPS weapon. Apart this, it has bad control (I mean stop an horde and make it harmless for your mates), bad stagger, average mobility, average defensive abilities (to understand what I mean it’s enough think about Rapier).
Moreover 1H Axe and 1H Falchion would be bad even if A&F didn’t exist.
Well a lot of your information is not exactly accurate. Some of it is. I agree its a very strong weapon. I just disagree to the extent.
Yes, I know how to check the values. I also know how to check the values of the heavy. On armor, Heavy chain is higher dps than light chain, or light 1 block cancel. I think it is close to the same dps if you perfectly qq cancel light one, but that is nearly impossible because you have a very small window where the hitbox becomes active mid screen and the point where you lose dps.
You gave supporting evidence that A+F is better than 1H axe. I agree. Now you are making the claim that it is overpowered as compared to the melee arsenal of all characters. To do that, you have to compare it to every characters meta weapons. That means you’re saying it’s OP compared to DD, SD, T-spear, Bill Hook, Etc.
The one difference between A+F and some of the other OP options is that A+F isn’t as reliant on headshots. So I guess there is some justification in saying that it needs a higher skill cap. However, I would contend that all of the other options I listed are better than A+F. DD is the highest dps weapon in the game by a substantial margin. You seem to only be looking at the raw damage numbers and not taking finesse multipliers into consideration. If you even have an average headshot ratio, I would say the order of best weapons goes DD, Bill Hook, T-Spear, SD, A+F. T-spear doesn’t have quite as much damage as the other options, but it has insane control and can carry a group better than most other weapons. It also has innate BCR for getting revives, etc.
I do think A+F needs a nerf to its push stab. Having heavy linesman and 20% crit is kinda absurd.
What are you using as the base damage? The axe hit or the falchion hit? are you using falchion cleave and axe damage to come to this conclusion?
Also note that falchion on A+F doesn’t cleave much on champ or above. It has a damage cleave of 7.07 mass with no modifier. Falchion and other 1h swords have linesman which is a huge difference.
It is 3x10 which I’m pretty certain is the same as T-Spear and T-Spear is much safer due to its stagger and cleave.
- Falchion does something like 2.5 base damage to armor on light attack. It’s certainly not ideal to spam light chain and that chain is pretty poor armor dps. Worse than 1H axe light chain by a considerable margin.
The armor dps is easily outclassed by multiple weapons. X-sword, War Pick, 2HH, DD, maybe SD, Great Axe, all have higher armor damage.
Again, I agree that it is overall very strong and it could be argued that it needs a slight nerf. The degree to which you’re claiming it’s overpowered is just not true though.
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I won’t argue with this. Headshot multipliers is not something i did use for the argumentation simply because the values are not given in the armory (or I managed to never find them). So before I use wrong numbers I will just leave it out. However, it does play into one of my main arguments, namely for the ease of use for Axe&Falchion and the very low skill cap. I have less problems with weapons having above average performance if they need a substantial skill to justify it. This is not given in this case. Also please note that you have listed Axe&Falchion on the fifth place of best weapons. If this is not above average by an arsenal of 41 weapons then I don’t know what it is.
And at least for Dual Daggers you have to get a lot closer and (I would have to check, not right now) all hits can at best damage two enemies. So Dual Daggers is somewhat justified although a lot of its performance also comes from the crit chance and bleed effect. Sword and Dagger is again very easy to use, still harder than Axe&Falchion. And Billhook I will just believe you because a recent thread discussed it in detail and came to similar results. So Billhook and Axe&Falchion are both on top of the game.
A bit of a sidenote: As some people claim, would you say that Billhook has poor (or only average) handling of hordes?
For the moment simplified the Axe (actually a weird mixture which muddies the argumentation) damage as I mention single target infantry damage. In hordes it does look a bit different. But if you look at something like Dual Daggers it also only damage two enemies per hit. Rapier hits more targets but has lower base damage than the Falchion. So it is a mixture of both because it gets the best of both.
What really gets on my nerve is the absurd speed increase to other axes. I admit that axes overall are slightly underperforming. It does however not justify this increase for the A&F. Also take note that there is no other weapon in the game which has this high of armor damage on their fast light attack chain and you have to mix attacks. All other weapons which are faster like Dual Daggers, Rapier, S&D, etc … all have no innate armor damage on their fast light attack chains (with one or two exception on the third hit). It is a characterisitc unique to the Axe&Falchion, again playing into the very high “accessibility”.
Not argueing that T-spear is probably the safest weapon in the game with still having nice dps. Doesn’t meant that A&F is bad in that regard or even risky to play. And I think I made the difference because you said it has the mobility of 2H weapons while stuff like Warhammer, Pickaxe, Executioner, Great Axe, etc all has significantly worse mobility values which are also the weapons which have a higher single target armor damage than the Axe&Falchion so it has an edge there as well.
Why is this numbered O.o? Considerable margin? The Axe&Falchion four hit combo is faster than the 1H axe three hit combo by about 10 %. Two strikes are identical for the axe so we have to compare two Falchion hits with one axe hit. Does the axe more damage? Yes. Considerable? No, over the whole combo it would be about 15 % IF they were of the same speed. If we regard the higher speed of Axe&Falchion it comes down pretty close. This is in the scenario where we fight only armored units. In mixed hordes Axe&Falchion hands down wins because it is safer due to the Falchion’s horde handling.
Yes, I mentioned it earlier myself. But X-Sword, Great Axe and War Pick are considerably slower to use and as such of higher risk. For Dual Daggers you have to get intimate with your armored buddies. And if 2HH is Dual Hammers I would have to check values again because I don’t think that that is the case.
As you said yourself, it belongs in the top 5 (or was this only under a specific case) of the available weapons. I argue for different stuff. My main point is that it can and never should be the base case to which we buff other weapons because it is far to strong for that. I argue that it is far to easy to use and doesn’t come with the risk most other high damage weapons have. I argue that is is to fast, especially the first axe hit. A weapon this easy to use shouldn’t come with so many advantages. It isn’t good balance. And again the question: Does the weapon in your opinion have a weakness? I mean something stupid like it can’t control horde is a non-starter because it is a specific characteristic of shield weapons and the T-spear. If that is the balance measurement I could complain that my Axe&Shield doesn’t shoot fireballs.
Again, does A&F have a weakness in your opinion which justifies the significant above average stats and the ease of use?
I don’t ask for much. Like I said in my first post. Increase the first hit in the combo from 0.43 to 0.65. Swap the attack speed numbers of the 2nd and 3rd hit with the values of 1st and 2nd hit from Falchion (because Falchion should be the faster weapon). And increase the fourth hit in the combo to 0.5. Just make the damn light combo slower. It would STILL be very powerful. But by changing this it would be more in line with the balanced weapons. Falchion would also be faster and slightly better (probably needs more). Not sure if more speed for the axe is the right solution or if the base damage should be increased.
I mean I have given you some values. If you have indeed a lua script where you can test it out just try it. And then you can decide if the weapon is still good or not.
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The most obvious weakness is that it has the lowest mobility of any Dual Wield or 1 handed weapon. Even lower than flail now.
It doesn’t have any major weaknesses for dps. However, I will say if you’re just running around left clicking everything, then it’s dps will not be very good. Your armor dps will be very poor. You estimated about 15% lower than 1H axe without even considering axe’s 10% crit chance or doing the optimal combo of block cancelling l3 or push stabb, light, light, light. I would say that estimate is about right. You need to be able to choose optimal attacks to make this weapon perform at a high level, so there is definitely some skill in making the weapon good. Also, you will obviously do far more damage if you headshot than if you bodyshot. It just isn’t as headshot reliant as the dps weapons with big finesse multipliers.
And yes I say it’s in top 5, with rapier and X Sword right behind it. If you think the whole top tier needs nerfed then that’s a totally valid opinion.
I think that’s a crazy assertion. Bill Hook horde clear is nuts if you can headshot. 9.9 cleave w. linesman + a 2.7x multiplier.
That’s about a 20% decrease in dps on light attacks. At that point, you would have a weapon that is basically an exact combination of axe and falchion without linesman for falchion. That seems like too much nerf.
It is currently .51. Are you saying increase it by 0.5 or decreasing it to 0.5?
Also, just to clarify, you have to double the armory damage nubers for heavies on dual wield weapons. It’s the damage profile of each weapon in the attack. Not the overall profile.
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Is the armory even updated?
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Very kind call “stupid” the opinions of others… specific of shields!? 1H Mace/Hammer, 1H Sword, 2H Hammer, Exe Sword, 2h Sword, Mace and Shield, Sword and Shield, T-Spear, Mace and Sword, Double Hammer, Axe and Shield, Dual Sword, Sword and Dagger, Spear and Shield, Flail, Rapier (thanks 1 stamina push), Flaming Flail, Fire Sword, Fire Dagger…
They all are weapons with a better control than A&F.
Some of them are meant to stagger (as main job) and they have other malus like a not-brilliant damage (2H Hammer, Shields)… other ones are more “jack of all trades” (like Flail). But, all of them, have the “control” between their “advantages/purposes”.
And please, don’t tell me “X weapon maybe has slightly more control than A&F but it’s bad in every other side”… in my list I just wrote a couple of examples to show how A&F control isn’t good… Then, some of my examples, are strong weapons… other ones are bad. But this is another speech.
A&F does a lot of damage, sure. But it almost bounces against hordes… the stagger/control is zero.
Maybe it’s “stupid” for you, but it’s an heavy disadvantage (both because you can’t protect mates and because it makes risky fight an horde and because you can’t do space).
If we add that, in the other fields, A&F is just average… I think it’s nothing that can break the game (like, for example, season 1 Battle Wizard). Just a strong weapon that does its job and very fun to use.
Then I can’t understand the speech “we can’t bring every weapon at A&F level”… it’s nonsense, we can’t compare different weapons. Every weapon needs a different treatment.
Just a simple example: 2H Hammer. It has a “solid foundation” (best stagger apart shields, very good armor damage)… but we can’t exploit these advantages because it’s really, really slow.
With a little bit of more attack speed (5%? a little more?), it would become a very good weapon with a perfect niche… but it means bring it to A&F level!? Yes? Nope? Dunno? You just helped a weapon to fulfill its niche.
Honestly? I didn’t want to quote you… we have a very different vision of the game… and it’s nice… but an our discussion would not bring anywhere.
But, friend, you can’t call “stupid” an idea just because you don’t agree.
Imo, for the A&F, perhaps nerfing its stamina shields to 2.5 (like the Greataxe), its crit and mass modifier on its push attack and its attack speed by a small amount would balance it with the med-tier weapons. All small changes.
The other top-tier weapons should be brought in-line and the under performing ones pushed up a little.
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Kinda. You have to click the individual attacks to get the damage profile. It’s also based on 600 Hero Power.
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I don’t think there is that much of a gap in our evaluation just that we come to slightly different conclusions which is okay. For me the A&F is still higher than most weapons simply because of it’s easy and fairly safe use. And correct me if I’m wrong but you said the A&F might need a nerf. So we agree here too, just not on the extent of it.
I wouldn’t express it that stark. But yea, I want a large middleground. Rise up the bottom, bring down the top.
Okay, that fits with what I have experienced. I just wanted to get a second opinion as I have seen this statement before.
Like I said, we disagree on the extent. I wouldn’t call it an exact combination (although I think it should be some mixture of fast hitting Falchion and heavy hitting axe and not be just the best of both). If you check, the first A&F hit is the mirrored version of the third axe strike but is faster by more than 50 %. As such decreasing the speed of that specific attack by the mentioned value would make it still better than the axe. And the A&F would still have ist crazy fast charge attack which gives it ist own uniqueness alone. You would keep the horde handling but you would be forced to mix in more charged attacks.
Hm, A&F has two 0.5 and two 0.4 hits. I thought the 0.4 hits were both time the axe so I might have mixed this up at the late evening. Mainly I want to slow down the axe speed in the combo as it is significantly better than ist counterpart.
Please note that I make a separation between argument and person. I don’t normally call people stupid because I don’t have enough data to make this assertion. And we seem to have a different interpreation of Horde control. For me it is to stop a horde in its track if you are in something like a corridor or if you can make lots of space in open field. And yes, shield weapons and spear are the only ones who can do this. Executioner has no control, if the horde wants to ignore you it will do this, the same for Rapier and Dual Sword and Sword and Dagger and 1 H Sword and 1 H hammer and Fire Dagger and Mace&Sword. All of these don’t show crowd control abilities. Flail, 2H Hammer, 2H Sword, maybe double hammer have a bit better control but nothing which protects your team mates. But it is to off-topic for now.
For the rest I will refrain from answering because
I can and will accept arguments made by people like Kitten or Sleezy (although I still very much disagree with his Unchained/Pyromancer evaluation) because they back their positions will lots of data and usually heavy testing. But other users tend to create extreme situations to defend normally unholdable positions.
In your case, a lot of your evaluations I have trouble following because they don’t fit with what I experience in-game like your statement that Billhook has only average horde handling (correct me if I remember this wrong) which has been denied by about every other user here. I have no interest to stop you from posting and I will refrain from calling out your solitaire position in several threads because even a single person can be right and everyone else can be wrong. As such it is necessary that we clash in the forum so the developers get every insight possible.
But it doesn’t stop me from singling out ideas if I find the core argument laughable and be sure I wouldn’t do this if I would think that it is a mere difference in opinion.
As you said, we have a different vision. Although I think it is less the vision and more the perception of the current game. So we will get on each other nerves for a while. But as said before, it is kinda necessary so I will keep doing it, same as you.
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Never said you called “stupid” a person.
Apart this, about control, there isn’t any interpretation, it’s just a well defined concept that developers have had in mind to balance the weapons (indeed certain weapons have “control” in description). Control is the ability to stagger an horde, put the majority of the enemies (in that horde) in “staggared status”. This make the horde easier to fight, harmless for your mates and enemies will receive more damage.
- Every Shield can control the horde thanks “bash” and heavy push;
- Fire Sword and Fire Dagger have “bash” too;
- T-Spear, 2H Hammer, 1H Sword and Double Hammer have 23 of stagger + tank property (enough to stagger the entire horde at cata too) and wide sweeps;
- Burning Flail has the explosion;
- Both Flails have 18 of stagger + tank property + ignore shields + and wide sweeps;
These are just the the most obvious examples.
As you see, it’s not Shields’ particularity (like, following your example, fireballs are Conf/Fireball staff’s particularity).
p.s you said developers obtain info from discussion… can be true (rarely), but calling “stupid” an idea, keep saying “denied by every other user” or “nobody has issues against hordes with Axe&Falchion”… it doesn’t help developers. In no way. It just SEEMS a questionable way to strengthen your reasons… but you can consider this just an advice. I have no interest in continuing this point.