No, that’s not true at all. Their are attacks that you sometimes have to use when under pressure. The spear for example gains a large movement boost on heavy, which can let it hit specific things like a a special to the side quickly when kiting or when reaching a tall target in a horde. Dual Swords (armour cleaving heavies, good under pressure for obvious reasons) SnD (heavy 1 is useful for fighting multiple enemies and horde clear) and the 1h Sword (first heavy is very fast + crit chance) also have heavies that are still good under pressure.
The idea isn’t coming from a vacuum. It comes from experience. In my experience, kerillian’s weapons have heavy attacks that can and should be used under pressure. This change would encourage mixing in more charged attacks instead of always playing it completely 100% safe with lights. The game already does this a little, but this change helps further that and makes thp on crit/headshot more interesting mechanically.
Currently with this talent it’s optimal to pretty much always be chaining lights for safety/thp generation.
Because you were acting like that’s somehow relevant to the discussion in the first place. How is it? My goal was to make crit/headshot not reliant on light spam. You said all it would do is enable the way I play, but the way I play is the way many, many players play. The majority even.
I mean, you and I both know this sounds extremely situational. Much less useful than a rapier charged one for instance?
1h sword agreed. However, don’t you think that for DS and SnD, they would still take cleave, precisely because of the things you’ve mentioned, like armor cleaving heavies/linesman? In fact, just by the examples you’ve given, you can see that the weapons that would benefit the most from your suggested change are weapons that have low cleave on heavies + fast aspd + range. Hence, I feel that the overall effect of this change would be to make temp hp on crit good for those weapons while for the majority of weapons, it wouldn’t make a significant difference.
Your goal was influenced by the way you play, which is charged headshots. However, you have not demonstrated the need to tie heavy attacks to headshots to me, because it benefits a small subset of weapons instead of the majority. Since I use the elf spear, I do not rely on charged headshots when using crit talent. I aim for headshots on light attacks.
Not really. The Rapier’s first charge level only hits breakpoints with WHC’s tag + DK + Assassin on Cata. For example, with Flense it takes the Rapier’s partial charge the tag, Assassin and 20% vs infantry to 1 shot Globadier’s and Leeches/Stormers (Cata). The Rapier’s first charge level has less reach and a far, far lower movement curve than the Spear’s charged attacks. The spear’s heavy stab takes Enhanced Power to 1 shot Packmasters on headshot. If you can take Assassin, it also 1 shots Leeches/Stormers and Globadiers. Don’t take this the wrong way, I’m not saying the Spear is a better weapon than the Rapier. I’m saying its heavy attacks are useful.
By the way, I suggested the Rapier’s first charge level getting half the effect (so 1.5 instead of double). This is fair because it’s very fast and shouldn’t get the full effect.
Here’s the quote from the original post:
What’s the point you’re making here anyway? Are you insinuating that I have a selfish goal in mind?
Well yes, I do. That is, I’d like a thp talent that’s rightfully considered underwhelming by the majority of players to be buffed because I think it would be a cool talent that encourages skillful gameplay, but I want it to be done in a thematic and interesting way instead of one that continues to encourage light spam when a player is on the defensive. Cleave thp already does that. This change lets a player not, in a sense, be punished for using a charged attack instead of chaining lights and instead be rewarded.
Let’s do the math:
One Dual Sword heavy = 3 thp per headshot, doubled by charged attack = 6. Since it’s two weapons, two headshots are possible which grants 12 thp, but the cap added makes it max out at 8. This is without requiring headshot crits. That’s 8 thp. That’s fantastic, and doesn’t require more than two targets to get its max thp return like cleave does, but it requires skillful headshots. That’s how it balances out. That’s the case for all dual wield weapons. For the non dual wields, that’s six thp per heavy headshot. It would even be decent with Saltz’ Greatsword. I was honestly expecting people to express concerns that it would be overpowered.
It would still be better on these weapons than it is now. Whether or not it outright replaces thp on cleave for them when it’s available is not within the scope of this discussion.
The way the majority plays is by using both light attacks, charged attacks and by aiming at heads. The skill level varies, but most players do not only use light attacks.
What do you mean I haven’t? What? I wasn’t trying to tie charged attacks to headshots. What does that even mean? I’ve argued that a player should not have to just spam light attacks for thp when using this talent. They should getting rewarded for landing those heavies.
Ah! Now I know why you’re disagreeing. It’s because you won’t benefit from it, except… you likely will. You aim for light attack headshots? Great, that’s fine. Unless you never use heavy attacks, you’ll still benefit from this at least somewhat. In fact, you’ll be rewarded for using the spear’s best single target dps combo, light stab > heavy stab, making your gameplay more complex if you so choose. Worst case you’re no worse off.
The only thing I can think of that wouldn’t benefit from this is Cloak of Mists Vanish Shade because of the insta kill on crit backstab, which is a very strong build that does not need to benefit from this. Handmaiden with maxed out crit chance should be using heavies sometimes simply for the consistent stagger and the movement curve they have, and Handmaiden doesn’t have this thp talent. Waystalker would still want to use heavies because they don’t have enough crit chance to make light chaining optimal single target dps (I don’t even know if it ever is more optimal than light stab > heavy stab at any level of crit chance outside of Shade, does anyone?).
Take a look at Saltz’s and the Elf’s weapons. Quite a few benefit from some level of heavy spam.
Saltz:
Axe - Heavy attacks have armour damage almost double that of Light attacks. They are easy to land and aren’t exactly slow. Since the axe has basically no cleave, Deathknell would be pretty nice on this.
Flail - After the BBB, the Heavies now do some very good damage and cleave a lot. In case you are not familiar with the moveset, both of the Heavy attacks are almost completely horizontal.
Falchion - Heavies whilst significantly slower than Light attacks do a lot of armour damage in comparison to Lights and aren’t that difficult land.
Greatsword - Heavy attacks do a lot more damage than the Lights and have Heavy Linesman as opposed to Linesman. Near enough horizontal swings from all attacks except the Push attack which is an overhead.
The A&F and Rapier need no introduction as to how well you can spam heavies whilst the Billhook would still be better with cleave, or so I believe, but headshot/crit should still work very well with it.
Keri:
Axe - Only the mad use the Elf’s axe but it is the exact same scenario as Saltz’s axe since they have the same damage numbers but Keri’s is faster.
Sword - Both Lights come at a roughly 45 degree angle and the 3rd is a straight poke. Heavies are, fast, powerful, easy to land and Heavy 1 and 3 are overheads. A shortcut to the double overhead is Push attack into Heavy 3 → Heavy 1. All heavies have +10% crit which is always nice to have. Even in its current state, headshot/crit is straight up better for the sword. Arguably one of the most suited weapon for the talent currently.
The Dual Daggers need to no introduction cause they have f*ck all cleave and the Sword and Dagger are a true hybrid where either cleave or headshot/crit are worth taking.
Considering only the Heavy attacks; the Spear, Glaive, and Dual Swords do not have spammable Heavy attacks but their Lights are relatively easy to land headshots with so I think they could make use of either cleave or headhot/crit. It would come down to personal preference.
Since charged attacks are slower, light chaining is optimal for thp generation with thp on crit/headshot. This creates ill-fitted simplistic gameplay that matches thp on cleave nearly identically in terms of what the player does to get thp, just with a headshot focus. The current version of the talent doesn’t add anything meaningful to the game regarding the way a player approaches combat, unlike the other thp talents. Look at how stagger thp can effect the way a player plays – they’ll use their high stagger attacks to generate temp. A player that uses thp on cleave will use high cleave attacks. With thp on kill, they’ll use their high damage, almost always single target attacks.
So what would it look like overall with the change in mind?
Thp on cleave – Fights the horde.
Thp on stagger – Provides crowd control and safety for others.
Thp on kill – Kill high health targets.
Thp on crit/headshot – Switches between what the players using thp on cleave and thp on kill do as the situation demands. Versatile, powerful, but pays for these strengths with the requirement of skill. This is fitting for Saltz and Kerillian overall because they are, for the most part, more kill focused than defense focused (the only exception is Handmaiden).
What does thp on crit/headshot do currently? The same thing as thp on cleave. You’ll pretty much always use the quick, safe cleaving light attacks to generate thp. The change would make it so that heavy attacks would be incorporated into the way the talent is used, which is how it would stand between cleave thp and on kill thp.
Does this need to happen? No. Is there a big problem with it being like thp on cleave? No. However, thp on crit/headshot is considered weak by most. I figured that it could be buffed, but why not in a way that makes it fundamentally more interesting, distinct and in a way that is incorporated naturally into combat, without any unusual actions, while still not over-complicating the talent (the core idea at the top is straightforward)?
I don’t think they’re that good. Heavy 2 has a significant charge time as well as block delay at the end. Also, in the time you took to get to heavy 2, due to being locked behind other moves, rapier is already at full charge. I just don’t think your suggestion would benefit it as much.
Yes, because you want it to be buffed specifically on charge attacks, but I disagree because certain weapons have charge attacks that are much more spammable than others, and they will benefit the most.
Why? You use the weapon attack that’s best suited for that situation. For some weapons, that’d be heavies. For some weapons, that’d be lights. Why should one weapon get rewarded just for landing a heavy, which is the best attack it could do in that situation? E.g. dodge-dancing a boss, elven spear simply spams lights. Rapier spams heavies. Why should the rapier be rewarded?
I mean, I agree there’s a benefit, but I could’ve easily gotten this benefit from thp with cleave as well. Which is why I said that this buff would be meaningless.
If you can’t see that the Spear’s heavy attacks are useful, there’s no convincing you of anything. I’ve already explained what uses they have. You’ve deliberately ignored the points I’ve made, like the ones about movement curves. I think I’d know if they weren’t useful considering I have a Handmaiden Spear true solo on YouTube. So would Core. Spear lights aren’t great for superarmour btw (including Mauler heads), so there’s another use for the heavies. The heavies aren’t only useful in true solos either. They’re useful everywhere.
Yep, just like how some weapons have spammable light attacks. Kruber’s 1h Sword is better at getting thp on cleave than than his Spear because Kruber’s 1h Sword has higher cleave and faster lights than Tuskgor Spear. Does this mean there’s a problem with thp on cleave? No. You’ve identified that some weapons are better with some thp talents than other weapons.
This is getting tiring. You’re reaching for points at best.
Light stab > heavy stab is optimal boss dps for the spear. Have you used the dps calc? Have you considered other weapons?
I’ve already explained the ‘why’ very thoroughly in the recent reply to James in this thread. Read it.
Yeah you use the attack suited for situation. On low health, that’s light attacks for generating thp (this is when thp is relevant) just like thp on cleave. Except…
You don’t apparently. You just use lights. So what’s the problem them? First it was elf weapons don’t benefit. Now it’s some weapons benefit more than others. Stop changing the goal post.
Nice try. You disagreed from the very beginning.
Again, cleave thp is not the benchmark here. Don’t make me repeat myself.
You’re not encouraged to do that with most thp talents or with crit/headshot in its current state. Thp talents don’t rigidly define how a player approaches combat but reward certain actions. With how much slower most heavies are, that means the light attacks are almost always going to net more thp with crit/headshot, because higher attack speed means more headshots/crits per second and also means the headshots are usually easier to land than the heavies are. So the idea I listed would make thp on crit/headshot further distinct from thp on cleave while also buffing it by making it reward both lights and charged attacks. I’m not sure if you were highlighting your own approach to combat, or disagreeing with the idea I’ve posted, so please let me know your intention.
Yes but this doesn’t mean you’re justified in suggesting balance changes that add the same problems.
I said the heavy 1’s uses were situational. In your post, you literally listed down situations in which it was useful. And then I listed some flaws with heavy 2, as well as comparing it to the charge time of rapier. What other responses were you expecting?
Yes, that’s why I use light 1 light 2 heavy 2.
If you’re dodge-dancing a boss, it’s simply safer to spam lights. If you’re not the one being aggroed, then sure.
You want to add a charged attack focus to differentiate the talent, while I maintain the headshot focus is enough. I still don’t see a compelling enough reason.
I didn’t want to go into specifics because that would require examining every elf weapon. I have agreed that 1h sword benefits from this, but my stand is that overall, elf doesn’t benefit from this change.
Like you’ve mentioned, this is indeed getting tiring. Chalk me up as a disagree
I would say that would be far preferable to the current state of affairs where some careers get pigeonholed into specific weapons because of their selection of thp talents. If all careers have access to the same ones that removes a layer of imbalance between them.
Homogeny is not an inherently bad thing. The game is balanced around all careers being able to sustain their HP in melee via temp health. So it makes perfect sense to give all careers the same base level of access to that functionality.
Like others, I think this is the most sensible fix. If there’s any worry about a blanket increase to 3 thp across the board being too strong, this model fixes the problem by only buffing the non-critical headshot portion of the talent. More consistent overall than our current talent, without being too overpowered.
Pretty much what I was saying, take Battlewizard, I feel pretty coaxed into Flamesword and Dagger.
Some people have expressed the same feelings towards Bounty Hunter and Huntsman.
Giving every career the same broad choice of THP talents ensure there are no coaxed weapon choices.
Give me an example of a change that wouldn’t. I shouldn’t even have to ask for an example, it should already be given. Simply buffing the return on crit/headshot would still favour faster weapons. All you’ve done is say this would be better for the Rapier than the Spear. Big whoop.
What? Again you simply can’t accept that this won’t benefit the spear as much as the Rapier. Pray, what thp talent isn’t better for the Rapier than for the Spear? How effective weapons are with thp talents is a part of weapon balance. They aren’t even meant to all be equally effective. Maybe it’s because, you know, the Rapier is super strong and needs a nerf which I’ve suggested many times in the past? I’ve suggested the AnF get it’s l1 slowed downed. You know what I’ve suggested for Kerillian’s weapons?
For the Greatsword I’ve suggested making the sweep after the heavy cleave standard armour. For the spear, giving it an extra dodge and improving the accuracy of its hitboxes for headshots (very relevant to this). For the 1h Sword, more infantry damage on lights. I can go on. But no, I’m a selfish Saltz player that doesn’t care about poor old Kerillian. Bah.
This is lower dps and mobility than light 1 > heavy 2.
It’s not dangerous to use heavies when dodge dancing a boss though even when aggroed. All heavies have a delay on blocking afterwards, including the Rapier.
Oh look you’ve finally expanded your single point by adding the headshot part. Good work. Only took how many replies? What weapons have spammable charged attacks?
Dual Swords (armour cleaving heavy, if you aren’t using its heavies than I don’t know what to say)
SnD, DD. Both are fast and very mobile.
1h Sword, 1h Axe. Again, both are fast and very mobile.
That leaves the Spear, Glaive, Greatsword and Spear and Shield. It’s completely fine for it to not benefit a few weapons greatly. These weapons are larger, slower and less crit-based weapons in the first place. They don’t have a finesse identity.
Time to do 2 Rapier full charges is 2s. Time for Spear light stab > heavy stab is 1.49s. Rapier gets 12 thp with this combo, Spear gets 9. That is mathematically fair.
Yeah, you’ve ignored the specifics and details quite a bit. So instead, you selfishly and hypocritically hyper focused the Spear while accusing me of suggesting this change for the Rapier’s sake and expecting a good response from me (which you got anyway, out of my own goodwill). I’m done with you, and so is likely everyone else reading this thread. Goodbye.
This is also true for all other forms of thp. Some weapons are better for cleaving, some are better for killing and some are better for staggering. It’s not a problem. Edit: I’ll add that a lot of attacks that are considered bad for headshots have cirt chance now (the upsweeps), and aren’t all even bad for headshots if a player is skilled enough and doesn’t just assume the given attack can’t do it, which is what many players do unfortunately.
A solution that makes little sense for Saltz or Kerillian. You could replace the healshare talent with an additional thp talent instead. What use would BH have for stagger thp with Saltz’ weapons? Look at WHC, who isn’t pigeonholed into using any specific weapon. Definitely doesn’t need thp on kill for his weapons to gather thp and yet on crit/headshot is the problem that BH has according to some, despite being someone that wants to kill elites at range with all but a single ranged weapon (and even then, Volley crits still kill elites well).
Not really. Some careers are meant to be worse at it than others. Most careers can’t get as much cleave thp as Merc because of his cleave passive. I fail to see why Saltz’ and Kerillian’s careers can’t have thp on cleave, on kill and the listed idea for thp on crit/headshot.
It’s also completely unnecessary to remove thp on crit/headshot for Saltz and Kerillian and replace it with stagger thp. But no, let’s make the game even more brute forced based for even the finesse careers, without choice.
I’ll give you three reasons why your idea is worse:
Doesn’t fully remove the imbalances between careers. Just mostly.
Still means Fatshark has to balance more than the minimum number of talents. Which is not Fatshark’s strong suit.
Limits potential for new melee weapon development for Saltzpyre & the elf.
No weapon type in the game relies on temp health on crit/hs to be good. But there are weapons that completely rely on stagger to function well. Cleave is the current universal option. And between on kill and crit/hs the former is more universal than the latter. Ergo, crit/hs is the least needed talent and also one of the most niche. By that logic alone it should not make the cut.
Unless Fatshark wants to surprise us by nixing melee thp talents and adding a thp trait onto every melee weapon. That’d be fine by me as well. So long as all careers have equal access to all options I’m all for it.
Do you think yours does? Do you think that Handmaiden won’t be far better with thp on stagger than Shade and Waystalker?
Oh boohoo. Don’t care. Fatshark is unlikely to implement a single suggestion here either way, so I’m not taking what they can and can’t do into mind (nor is it even a big ask).
Not really. Whatever they get will likely be covered by thp on cleave. Even hammers work with on cleave.
I already explained how it could act as a midpoint between kill thp and cleave thp and would be less niche.
Just give Kruber/Bardin/Sienna thp on stagger, cleave and on kill. Saltz/Kerillian get cleave, kill and crit/headshot.
Pretty sure I’m failing to see what on kill is needed for. All it does it reward being the one that lands the last hit. What weapons ‘need’ that? None besides maybe the 1h Axe.
You just want to remove the skill based thp option. That’s all I’m seeing here.
I highly doubt I should be tracking all your suggestions. My thoughts are from my experience using elf spear.
Yes, and I think this is fairly obvious.
Again, I’m not up to date on all your suggestions. I don’t support touching weapon balance to push up a lackluster temp hp talent.
Spear? Pretty sure that has.
I could talk about the Glaive if you want? I started talking about the spear because it was mentioned in the previous post. It’s a good example of how different weapons will benefit from your suggested change. I have not accused you of anything, I think you’re the one reading far too much into this as well as the headshot thing. The rapier, like elf’s 1h sword, is simply the most obvious beneficiary of your suggested change.
How would that not benefit the Rapier more than the Spear? The Rapier has far faster lights. Did you even read the rest of that paragraph I typed out? The speed difference between Rapier 2nd level heavies and Spear heavies is less significant than the speed difference between the lights of both weapons.
I didn’t expect you to. I expected you to not assume I only had the Rapier in mind. I don’t see how it’s okay to cherry pick threads and make assumptions about my intentions, like how you’ve done so with the Riposte thread. Seems lazy at best.
Those changes weren’t for the talent, that’s a side benefit.
One weapon. Glaive for example isn’t a finesse weapon, look at its bodyshot on the heavy’s non-crit. It’s still going to be better and work more effectively for a whole heap of weapons for both Saltz and Kerillian.
Nice try.
Or any dual wield weapon which could now reach the 8 thp they can only get on two critical headshots with just 2 headshots and one crit. They’d all get 6 with the heavies in the hands of a skilled player. That’s more than on cleave. I expect you’ll ignore this part like every other time I’ve brought it up. Or that the Falchion and the 1h Axe (referring to the separate weapons, not the AnF) have heavies that are faster than the 2nd level charged heavies of the Rapier. Or that the Billhook’s heavy is faster than the Rapier’s 2nd level charge. Or that SnD’s and Dual Daggers’ heavy chains are faster than the Rapier’s full charge loop. Or that Dual Sword’s heavy 1 is faster than the Rapier’s full charge. Or that the Flail’s are also faster. Your point that the 2nd charge level of the Rapier is more spammable than the other weapons here (maybe for some, but not most) is false.