They just kinda ruined Bardin. I mean mostly the Slayer but I find none of Bardin’s kit fun to play anymore. At least comparatively. Shade far outclasses Slayer, Zealot out tanks Iron Breaker and is far more offensive and Waystalker out Rangers the Ranger.
I don’t seem to be able to make Bardin’s kits fun at the moment. Partly because he feels so anemic both in respect of his former glory and partly his comparison to other current picks that do his role so much better and party because of the new difficulty baseline I guess.
I don’t find kitting Slayer with Two Handers a solution, its just not how I enjoyed slayer. Shade is how I used to play slayer but safer and really more damaging and no restriction on ranged. Iron Breaker is just Iron Breaker, effective usefull in a team and boring to play. I don’t know what you did to Ranger but… I just die, during stealth out of stealth shield doesn’t seem to help. Just boop your down, thanks for playing.
Am I just having a long adjustment period or arew other people also suffering a lack of Bardin love?
Playing as Ironbreaker with shield is actually some of the most fun I had in this game since a long time. Believe me, no Zealot is going to out-tank that… No green circles apart from “damage taken” and “most revives”, but it’s suprising how often I could clutch with this class.
Slayer feel a bit different though, a lot more squishy. I’d actually think Slayer is better compared to Zealot, and Zealot may well be stronger now. Slayer with dual hammer / single axe is still loafs of fun though, you might want to give that a shot.
I haven’t really played Ranger yet. The whole evasive / ranged playstyle has never been my cup of tea. When I play Bardin I’m a Dawi, dammit, I’m not going to hide, I’m going to be in the thick of the fight.
It gets crit chance bonus on its lights, and its lights do more armor damage than those of dual axe. Use the hammers for hirdes, axe for armor / elites / bosses. Works out quite well.
Well in that case I guess I’ll just not play it. A slayer with dual hammers and one axe is just… why even bother. I’m sure they’l make it not suck again.
I don’t know how people are enjoying IB. It just feels so meh. Maybe its the pubs Im playing with and that lack of co ordinated team play.
A large part of it, at least in my opinion, is just due to melee weapons.
Other characters get things like glaive, crowbill, axe and falchion, etc, which are all extremely strong weapons. The best we have is our two handed hammer or dual hammers.
Our weapons are “Good”, but not “Great” like some other classes have.
I’m finding ranger fun as hell way better than he was before.
IB not much of change only nerf to fireweapons.
Slayer is glass cannon that should be from start
Dual hammers still is on par with axe&falchion
I will admit, I am using IB again. Bardin is my least used class with only around +80 levels or so. But I’m having way more fun with him now. Slayer takes some getting use to though for sure.
Slayers a lot more squishy. 2H greataxe can’t reliably stagger Berserkers on Cata so they’re more dangerous again. Because of it’s comparative squishiness under duress while it does the most damage and has the best armor clear I don’t think it’s weighing that high into Cata. Terrific firepower when performing flawlessly with no stray hits. Worse than a bot if you get downed ever for any reason. And this is from the angle of somebody who did a quarter of his successful pug runs as it.
IB is hilarious overturned in the new game mode if you’re the type of person who likes living out some “tank” fantasy. Arguably the strongest and more reliable career. Just equip some shield and spam push into the wave. Helps if you’ve got netflix on in another monitor to combat the boredom. Team falls into duress? Just press F and continue side step dancing while pushing. Most consistent clear rate because it simply is the safest and skill forgiving career in the game. Frankly in the prospect of cata I’d say it’s his best career by a huge margin. The fact alone that Gromril Curse can dislodge specials off of you is actually insane. Blood of Grimnir giving you free power means you stagger crap nobody else can if other people are nearby, meaning you can quite literally walk up to a cluster of CW and stunlock them with a shield.
Fun for me? No. But it sure as hell effective given how blatantly overturned it is.
Ranger Veteran is almost as safe as IB with a constant 30% DR that’s up forever giving you effectively 130 health. Or you could drop that for for faster shots for more horde control. Because of damage adjustments, Ranger’s Ambush is my preferred over both Surprise Guest and Parting Gift simply because it has more impact if a boss pops up then using a grenade you (might not) have while still having slightly less impact than a fire bomb during a horde would have. Share and Share Alike have immediately more impact given that it effectively gives you unlimited ammo and Scavenger is finally tuned since pots are now mixed into that pool of muck you can get out of that 20% making it feel like the only no brainer choice.
Outside of IB being able to self dislodge specials and in general being hilariously overpowered in this new difficulty and Slayer being made out of wet tissue paper I’d say Bardin is alright as a whole with the exception of some noticeably bad talents. it’s the game’s interaction with the kit that feels off, not the career itself.
One danger (at least in the past) with Pubs while using eg A&S is if your teammates are bad your tankiness doesn’t do them that much good, as A&S while good vs single elites is just too slow if you have to deal with a whole lot of enemies on your own. Shielded weapons can be a trap like that.
Can’t speak for hammer and shield in its current form.
Personally I play IB a lot like Bardin’s other careers in melee, just more tanky and with his ult to bail out your teammates when things go bad. Which means 1h axe or pick and drakefires if you want great melee AP and decent horde clear OR dual hammers (which is more like a traditional tank imo as your CC is great) with handgun or crossbow. Otherwise 1h hammer if you don’t have BtU.
I like the latter more and I’ve never ever felt useless with it. Sure, a shield would be nice vs ratlings etc., but there’s something about being an angry Scottish bowling ball charging into battle that’s immensely enjoyable.
A counter-perspective to the usual IB takes shielded weapons and RV takes DPS is that IB is already very very tanky, so he doesn’t need a shield to be survivable. In fact, you can afford to be way more aggressive on IB than his other careers most of the time.
Pre-WoM at least A&S only got me through Champ, his other weapons got me through Legend.
I’d argue that due to inability to block for others there aren’t any tanks in most of gaming. And then even if it were the case that your blocked attack automatically does touch others, the case can be made that dwarfs are terrible “tanks” for their size (other characters will be hit before attack lands on the shield).
If we were talking about from a pure blocking perspective sure. But that’s not how anybody uses Bardin. You shove crap endlessly or use your charge attack shield bash endlessly. Tank in the trinity has always been about damage prevention for others while reducing or preventing damage to yourself.
50% push power
30% radius
Increase stamina range?
No horde, elite cluster, or even patrol is getting within a foot of your squishy backline without falling all over themselves on the ground. On Cata this level of power is simply too strong. Nobody else barring footknight has this. And given your ability to turn any patrol in the game into a safe pick, no other career in the game can do that. In Righteous Stand where they crap chaos warriors on you, a troll on you, and an endless array of specials you’re safe in the knowledge that due to cdr built into a talent you can back to back taunts and everybody will be just peachy.
It’s outrageously strong, simply the strongest the career has been because stray hits are a near guarantee multiple times in a run. Runs as IB simply are healthier runs with less stray hits. And that probably shouldn’t be that way. If you’ve got and elite boss and special killer you can then take the drakegun. Which was already comically strong after the buffs let it eradicate armor and is even stronger now still.
Park your rear in a hallway. Let out globs of fire, and apologize to your team for forcing them to be unable to do anything while you carry that encounter.
Oh, I’m not arguing he’s strongest tank in the game, just that there’s inherent flaw in how it’s done and probably what he’ll be lacking after probable nerfs.
Elf has been the best class since forever, atleast in the damage department. No point in comparing elf to other classes.
And I kinda like ranger bardin right now. Works great in legend, but at the cataclysm bombs become less useful. (Still using the same kit from previous patch. Dual Hammers and shotgun.)
I would say slayer is worse and 1h axe and dual axes are worse. IB was the easiest character to get into legend 2.0 because he forgave the most flaws and that’s still true. Dual hammers are crazy strong. RV has some fun talents you can bomb and pot which i originally scoffed at but bombs are really useful since blowing up hordes is actually worthwile depending on positioning. Last resort is actually really strong and if you combo it with potion drop concoction you can ult pot unload a crap ton of damage.
Fun is subjective of course but now that shields have viability you can actually run the H/S IB and tank like crazy and have it be useful And while not necessarily good throwing axes are pretty fun, and again combo with last resort. If you can manage the pair you can at a moments notice up your RV melee damage by 25%.
Slayer gets it the worst because the play style for the class was “murder blender” and in the carefully block and consider positioning meta isn’t really his thing. I think people undervalue how much the THP nerfs hurt him as well since if you murdered a lot before you could DPS past the few mistakes to sustain your fury with a buffer of white health.
IB is still a completely busted OP easy mode. Not fun for me personally but a lot of people loved him before and love him now for the same reasons.
Slayer is a proper glass cannon now - which is exactly what makes him fun and exciting, for me at least. A total powerhouse when you play perfectly, a total trainwreck when you’re taking too many hits.
Ranger Vet has plenty of utility and with throwing axes you can take advantage of Last Resort quickly and whenever you need it (+25% power) and turn into a Dawi blender.
His ult is not for hiding IMO, it’s for being aggressive and jumping in the middle of the horde and causing havoc there safely, taking pressure off of your teammates.
I don’t mind support roles and with RV I definitely feel very useful for the team + whenever I need to I can turn into a Slayer briefly. If “offensive support” sounds like something you’d like, RV should do it for you.
IB and Slayer are imo fine, but Ranger? I loved to play Ranger with Handgun and Dualhammers, killing all specials before they did anything and clear up with meele. Now that u get spamed with Beastman Hordes and barely got time for aim, you also got like 2-3 Times more specials to take care of. So it happens on quite a regular basis that one Mob sneaks a hit in and in his current form he just cant take it, 2-3 Hits from standard Mobs and your gone.