i believe strong weapons that are supposed to be strong, and weak weapons that are supposed to be weak
laspistol didn’t need a buff, it was perfect the way it was
autopistol didn’t need a buff, it was already super strong before thanks to its blessings
those weapons had no right being this strong
if the pick rate was low its fine, low pick rate is NOT a problem
if all weapons were the same and capable of performing the same jobs the game would be just shallow and boring
Laspistol is actually fine
Autopistol is good… but this is not a powerful weapon… This is a good weapon for players that want a fast gameplay… however, if you use it too much you can begin to steal all ammos and so being toxic for your team.
Yesterday, two times I ended on floor cause I could not do anything as I had no ammo (i was playing vet)… cause ammo were on the corpses of the players that died before me…
I’ve seen someone doing incredible work with this gun.
You can use it as a zealot as a quick switch weapon, but even on vet it can work if you aim well.
This weapon has a lot of critics chances.
I would not use it cause, let’s admit it, I s$ck with pew pew guns.
And I hate people that cannot accept that a player wants to use a niche weapon.
However, if you use a niche weapon, you have to take into consideration the pressure on ammo you can put on your team.
Sometimes I switch to melee as a veteran cause it takes too much pressure to continue to use my shotgun.
But that’s not what lot of players do.
There is a problem of ammo reserve for several weapons (MG Ia but not really used, infantry autoguns, shredder autopistol but I guess the guys that use it knows it, revolver, shotgun) that FS should solve.
But there’s also a problem about players.
And here, a nerf that lower ammo reserve like they did on flamer is a bad move cause it pushes for more toxicity in the game.
EDIT: I realize that we’re off topic… did not pay attention to the title of this thread… sorry for that. I’ve reacted to Attilus post… and gone off topic.
Sidenote: there are a lot of players that play the team. When you meet these players, the game becomes too great… even more when these players have incredible skills and that you can learn from them.
This type of player reminds me seriously to MOBA game players like Dota 2 or LoL, who get their moves wrong or perform mediocre, then start micro-managing their teammates.
→ “Why didn’t you use -Ability- while -thing that happened- was happening to you?”
→ “Why did you buy -Item-?! You should have bought -other item- instead!”
→ “You were off-position. You should have really been at -other position- instead!”
→ “Why did you pick -character-?! You should have picked -other character- instead!”
Pretty sure this is the type of talk what Fatshark meant, when they said they wouldn’t give a scoreboard and other misc info on other players such as loadout.
Anyway, luckily there is no completely dead loadout or noobtrap item in this game. You can make anything work on Damnation, granted you have the endurance and survival skills necessary to off-set lack of damage.
yes people complain about the game max difficulty being too easy, but then bash on those who bring off meta
They might not be the same type of people.
The players I have seen running overkill Autopistol Shredder metas and such seem to just run through, not even commenting what other people do. I’ve seen 2 players carry full games on Damnation before, having absolute deadweights as teammates who spent +50% of the game dead and they didn’t seem to care.
The guys complaining in my experience are those who lost their runs a lot. Just like in those MOBA games I cited. It’s usually the ones with negative experiences who complain more.
Anyways to answer to the original post Power Sword has the right to be the best melee weapon, and for me it was well represented before the nerf in prebeta
balancing weapons with no right to change just because ‘‘too strong’’ or ‘‘too weak’’ is asenine
said that even for those who has the right to be represented differently (like chainsword → buff, plasmagun → buff, autopistol → nerf) i would add that
nerfing and buffing weapons before FIXING BLESSINGS is the most useless waste of time a dev could go trough period.
Ive seen a vet dominating in damnation with a laspistol I’m assuming he used some sort of Infernus setup? Maybe it was a bug or something I dunno but he was killing everything was cool.
The Laspistol just isn’t really as bad as people think. It’s essentially a mobile version of the Lasgun and the Lasgun is pretty good, if you can land headshots and have the right perks and blessings.
You can build a good Laspistol, too. It’s just not as overtuned as the Autoshredder Pistol with the two good Blessings on it, so you rarely see it used.
I would love to know what he used he was dropping crushers maulers etc so fast I couldn’t unload the bolter on them in time 
I tried a few things but it didn’t work very well maybe he’s a sharper shot than me
It’s not a bug, and Infernus isn’t necessary (Reassuring Accuracy is pretty much my top pick). Las Pistol is the secret op commissar weapon of invulnerability (it does struggle a bit against flamer/trapper/mutant).
I don’t know about crushers (you need rending from an ally), but maulers inside ult are deleted super fast.
Yes that was me and my friend, how could you tell?
I actually agree with this very much. But i think “best” can have some drawbacks and it needed something to give other weapons and players room to play.
THE problem with the PS was not the number of charges it had but was the BUG that allowed you to have MORE power swings then Intended. People posted about that and asked for a fix for that bug. They didn’t FIX the PS it they just nerfed it into trash and left the bug as is. The BUG is still there, I see people still get 5-8 power swings on some uses on some instances. Forcing People to Have to use Power Cycler is just stupid and leave NO ROOM for player choice when the weapon dose poorly without it. The PS was Designed to be used with the power charge!
I know other people have said it, but I’ll say it as well, STOP nerfing things that are affected by BUGs when they are STILL affecting weapons and blessings. FIX those first then GIVE us an END GAME STAT SCREEN to SEE what needs to be BUFFED or NERFED. The META as it cannot handle these changes with the CRAFTING system that FatShark have given us. We are not using Half of the weapons because they,
Fix first, Nerf second.
I was a Power Sword power user pre-nerf and it’s still my main weapon post-nerf. I don’t have Power Cycler on it so I’m stuck with 1 charge per activation. I do have Slaughterer IV so my uncharged damage is still very competitive.
The power sword still has excellent impact/stagger, it has good base cleave, and I have almost zero issues chewing through a horde with it uncharged due to my blessings.
While I might passably agree that the post-nerf power sword “doesn’t feel good” in its current state, I think buffing it at all again will just keep it in a meta state.
My advice is to get good at that point. Shove more. Create space for yourself before each activation. It never was and should never be a weapon that can get you out of any situation. I can’t count how many times I could play extremely poorly by being out of position, away from my team, and surrounded by elites just to kill them all in 1 or 2 swings. Now I actually have to think about how to use the weapon.
My consistent experience with people who hate the nerfed power sword is that they relied on it too much like a crutch, and fundamentally don’t know how to play the game as a result. They even call the Illisi force sword trash when it’s functionally the exact same weapon and strong—if not stronger than the current state of the power sword!
You just need to check out which blessings are available and you´ll know that powercycler is not mandatory, nor that perma-charging is needed to let this weapon shine.
You could go for slaughterer and sunder, jump into a horde with the first charge to kill as much as possible to stack damage / leave enemies wounded and finish them off normally.
You could also go for BM + Rampage or other combinations. Some might be stronger than others, but it´s not that you completely rely on them.
And imagine there are other weapons not being able to kill 10 targets at once. Maybe they hit only 2-4 and don´t even kill them. Yet poeple still clear damnation with them easily without getting hit much.
PS is still very strong. It´s just obvious that a bunch of players relied on it heavily and don´t want to deal with the real melee-combat. It´s just all about charging once and slaying through enemies easily.
And i´m sure if we would have perma-charges and FS would tweak the special-damage on a balanced level (like less cleave / targets + ~heavy-swing damage), then poeple would complain aswell.
And why do i believe that? Because the charged PS heavy is exactly the normal one… just with tons of stupid damage. So the only difference is that you can kill stuff easily, not that the gameplay is somewhat different because you used the special-button. (As it is on FS and chainweapons actually, which should stay as it is… just nerf Illisi-FS.)
Power Sword & Recycler currently is 1 powered up strike vs 3.
A rework that would be better:
Without Power cycler: 2
WIth Power Cycler: 3
Basically keeping average power level of the sword same as after patch but less reliant on getting power cycler.
I got Power Cycler ON patch 7 day, so I didnt notice a difference and it’s still good for me.
But without it, it feels meh / weak instead.
Hmm, maybe Power Cycler could be balanced with some cons? Like it gives you more energized swings per activation but reduce damage buff from it? So it will be more about - do you want less in total but more powerfull swings vs do you want to buff stay longer.
Power sword really shouldn’t have had a damage or stagger buff on charge; always on, low stagger and flat damage to all armour types would have made it an interesting choice without it being particularly overpowered.
I think the reason behind the backlash against the Power Sword change, as well as identifying who is upset about it, is pretty obvious. We’ve all seen them, wading into a horde and waving their glowing sword around, and I’d argue there’s nothing wrong with this. If that’s what they find fun and it allows them to contribute to the team, that’s what should matter most.
However, when those same people start calling the Veteran useless after said weapon becomes a bit less effective and difficult to use, and would rather stop playing the game altogether than just try using something else, it’s also pretty obvious the weapon needed addressing. I will say that, between this and the recent Psyker buffs, it’s been nice not playing a with 2+ Sharpshooters every map.
Before making any judgement myself, today I took the chance to sit down and actually play with the weapon post-changes. I’ve not been fortunate enough to get Power Cycler (despite checking the shop near daily since launch), but after finding my previous Power Sword felt a bit lackluster, I rolled up a new one and was lucky enough to stumble onto this:
I’d argue that’s close to about the best you could hope for on the weapon without Power Cycler, and I have to admit, it felt like decently powerful, high skill/high reward weapon. It has the capability to deal with any threat reasonably well, and could chunk down hordes about as good as my old pre-nerf Power Sword, and in general felt like a less mobile Illisi.
But whereas the old Power Sword was very forgiving and simple to play, this was quite the opposite. Using the charge attack to set up, you’d activate the weapon while sliding at your target, then go for a charged headshot. If you hit, you get Brutal Momentum and a few stacks of Slaughterer, which you can then maintain on your next, unpowered heavy attacks. If you miss, you’re suddenly wagging a wet noodle around and trying to fight the weapon’s terrible mobility to make space for another attempt.
This was actually really fun, but between the said mobility issues and having to take time to charge the attack, the weapon couldn’t really cut it in clutch situations where reliability is more important. So all in all, a pretty balanced weapon. However, like a Power Cycler build, this is reliant on a very specific and relatively difficult to obtain blessing combination. Without it the weapon was decently usable, but clunky and unfun.
Most people seem to agree that any weapon, let alone something as iconic as the Power Sword, shouldn’t require specific blessing combinations just to be interesting or fun to use. Personally, I was extremely disappointed with the activation mechanic on the power sword (and honestly, power weapons in general) since I first got to play with them at launch. I really do think the weapon needs a total re-work.
However, this is probably unlikely and even if it does happen, quite far away. The issue is clearly that constantly having to charge the weapon is not a very fun playstyle, so here are a few suggestions (forgive that some of these have been repeated before on these forums):
Rather than having a set number of powered swings, allow the power sword, on activation, to cleave a certain amount of hit mass before losing the bonuses of being charged. This way you could kill a few smaller enemies without feeling the need to slowly activate the weapon between attacks.
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Power cycler could increase this hit mass by 150-200%, still being a very useful blessing, but not absolutely mandatory (Brutal Momentum may arguably be the better choice). We could then balance the weapon around powered hit mass and damage.
Fully fix all the bugs allowing additional powered swings, and let the weapon go back to having to charged swings before de-powering. It will still be weaker than before the patch, but will be a bit more forgiving and less clunky to use.
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Also, change Power Cycle to only give 1 extra charge. Still very useful, but no longer a necessary blessing.
Add a Tier 3 Power Cycler blessing that gives only 1 additional charge per swing to make a more easily useable version of the weapon accessible to more people.
tl;dr
As others here have mentioned, the issue isn’t so much with how strong the weapon is now, but with it’s general usability. The Illis works on one swing per activation because it has much better mobility, high damage outside of it’s charged attack, is powered off a class resource, and doesn’t need specific blessings to be fun or effective. The current Power Sword without specific blessings just feels clunky and bad to use by comparison.
It’s true that too many players exclusively used the weapon as a way to cope with higher difficulties, but after the initial Power Sword nerf months ago, it hasn’t exactly been killing anyone else’s fun the way something like a flamethrower arguably could.
That said, I don’t think the weapon should be reverted back to it’s previous state (along with the Brutal Momentum Combat Axe V, it was easily the best melee option for Veteran), but it does need some readjusting to be a fun and interesting weapon to use without specific blessings or combinations thereof, ESPECIALLY considering how difficult and luck based it is to obtain them at the moment.
