Normalize Thunder Hammer Cleave, or at least make the Crucis less Frustrating to Use

[Manacraft]

@dragomusic

You responded to me not liking how the Crucis only overhead attack being a light attack should just have me not use and and use the Ironhelm, and then later you say the Crucis should have a charged overhead heavy. You could’ve just agreed with me lol.

I don’t see how explaining that the crusis charged light has some utility (which you claim it doesn’t) and arguing for e.g. an overhead charged heavy in a pre-ironhelm setting are contradictory or mutually exclusive. Sorry, but I’m just not following you here.

@dragomusic

Getting some mixed signals here, do you want the Hammers to remain as they are mechanically? Or would you like them to be changed in some way?

Maybe I’m not doing the best I can to explain this. We’ll take it from the top.

Once upon a time, there was a world in which the ironhelm did not exist. Back then, the community - myself included - argued for some sort of solution to the problem of wasting too many charged hits on irrelevant targets. Fatshark’s response was to give us the ironhelm, a hammer with a cleaving effect that in return had a harder time reaching breakpoints and a (IMHO) worse move set. It’s not my cup of tea, but it’s nice for the people who like it, so I thought the matter was probably settled, at least as far as Fatshark was concerned.

Fast forward to patch 13, a patch where you hardly have to sneeze at a crusher to kill it because everything’s been buffed through the roof, and your thread arrives asking for a buff to the crusis hammer. I think that’s a bad idea because killing elites is quite frankly already easy as pie and doesn’t need to be any easier. Crusis has a more powerful charged attack than ironhelm, and if patch 13 is to be the standard for how easy it is to kill elites, then I think it’s fair to keep the crusis as is. In a world like that, we don’t need more powerful tools for killing elites (and that’s not even touching the topic of horde clear, where hammers also received significant buffs).

The good news is that concern has now been somewhat alleviated by patch 14. It’s at least something that fatshark agrees that elites shouldn’t just fall over the second you look at them. Anyway, that brings us to the part about our different view on the whole crusis vs ironhelm situation:

@dragomusic

Again ancedotal evidence has me seeing the Crucis be a mid weapon, while the Ironhelm is much better with a higher skill (I guess because people struggle with it?) to hit certain break points.

You see the ironhelm as being the straight up better choice. I think it’s probably crusis (though not by a particularly wide margin). You think that the crusis hammer needs a cleaving charged attack just to catch up to the ironhelm. I think that if you give the crusis hammer the cleaving attack that the ironhelm has, the ironhelm will fall out of favor to the point of hardly being used.

But since we probably can’t agree on that, then we should at least be able to agree that the crusis hammer has a more powerful charged attack. That’s fairly indisputable. This means that if you give the crusis a cleaving charged heavy, you’re moving the needle for what thunder hammers can do. It’s a buff, straight up. Do you honestly think that no one will subsequently ask for ironhelm buffs to get it up to par with the crusis? If not, why? Moving one piece moves another.

One last thing: Breakpoints matter more than you think they do. You say it’s only a matter of getting them, and once you’re there, the ironhelm is simply better. That’s leaving aside concerns about an RNG crafting system that we could also get into, but let’s just skip that whole debacle for the time being. Instead, to test your claim under the newly released patch 14, here’s the hammer I’d like to put in an order for. Craft me an ironhelm that can:

• One-hit a dreg rager
• One-hit a scab rager
• Two-hit a crusher

With non-weak spot, non-crit hits from a cold start with T4 thrust. And no, you can’t use your ult.

I ask because that’s the crusis hammer I’m currently trying to make, and it turns out it’s not that easy. I’m not even sure it’s possible (the best one I’ve managed so far falls just a bit short on the scab rager with only a few percentage points left missing on the relevant stats and perks). And if I’m having problems crafting a crusis that can do those things, you’re gonna have a hell of a time creating an ironhelm that can.

And before you ask, the pre-patch 13 version of that wishlist would have been 1-hit a mutant and 2-hit a crusher. This was actually possible to get, albeit difficult.

Anyway, in closing, none of this means that I am principally opposed to a crusis hammer that has some sort of mechanism for getting its charged heavys past the occasionally annoying poxwalker. If you can do it in a way that keeps the ironhelm relevant without essentially buffing it through the roof and also keep the overall power level of thunder hammers relatively stable, then in principle I’m for it. If you, say, grafted the heavy move set from a MK IX heavy sword onto a thunder hammer, I’d be over the moon. Oh, and since we’re just theorycrafting here, whichever solution you prefer, I’d appreciate if it was one that doesn’t prevent charged attacks from working reliably with Until Death/Holy Revenant. It’s less of a problem than it used to be, but it’s still one of my pet peeves about the ironhelm.

[tfunknationtown]

What aspect would you buff up? Trash clear or special bonking?

[souI23]

Now you all will call me crazy, but I have to say it: both aspects and non only

• Light attacks should have more flak and carapace damage… atm if we compare them to the Vermintide version they’re simply ridicolous

• Heavy attacks should stagger more (Ragers and Maulers included)… atm they’re really slow but they don’t feel able to make enough field control

• Thunder attack should cleave more and stop at the first “heavy enemy”… atm it’s really hard to hit the target during an horde

[Reginald]

@Manacraft

Craft me an ironhelm that can:

• One-hit a dreg rager
• One-hit a scab rager
• Two-hit a crusher

With non-weak spot, non-crit hits from a cold start with T4 thrust. And no, you can’t use your ult.

This hammer hits the following breakpoints from a cold start:

1. one-hit scab rager on headshot
2. two-hit crusher on headshot
3. one-hit dreg rager on headshot with 3 stacks of inexorable judgement (the amount gained from inebriates pose)

I realize you wanted non-weakspot hits in all cases and I do, even, understand why. But it is practical to land repeated headshots in game, as you well know, and much easier to do on the ironhelm overall due to the easier delivery of powered horizontal heavy attacks. In a practical sense I am able to hit all 3 of your chosen break points with this hammer. I can also oneshot muties with just 1 stack of thrust from a cold start. Most of my builds with hammers leverage either Inexorable Judgement or Martyrdom and as a consequence this hammer (which isn’t even technically a godroll) is able to practically clear all relevant break points on all targets while being advantaged with much superior usage. At least it was superior usage prior to the horrendous push attack change. I will be ranting at length about that change later. But for now I just wanted to provide data to the conversation.

My preference for this hammer would be Carapace and Unyielding given the current breakpoints. Accepting ragers as the one thing I might not be able to easily clear from a cold start, though cold starts are pretty rare for a zealot these days.

[tfunknationtown]

If they made the heavies faster then I’d be ok, but they really could cleave/stagger more. Esp now that the ironhelm struggles to get them out.

[Manacraft]

@Reginald

I realize you wanted non-weakspot hits in all cases and I do, even, understand why. But it is practical to land repeated headshots in game, as you well know, and much easier to do on the ironhelm overall due to the easier delivery of powered horizontal heavy attacks. In a practical sense I am able to hit all 3 of your chosen break points with this hammer.

That’s fine. I have a preference for reliability, so I tend to go for what I know delivers, including when conditions are less than perfect. Of course, once you include headshots, lots of things open up. I’ll be trying to craft a new ironhelm as well once I farm some more dockets to do some testing on how it behaves under patch 14.

@Reginald

At least it was superior usage prior to the horrendous push attack change. I will be ranting at length about that change later.

Have fun.

[dragomusic]

@Manacraft

Once upon a time, there was a world in which the ironhelm did not exist. Back then, the community - myself included - argued for some sort of solution to the problem of wasting too many charged hits on irrelevant targets

Myself as well, I made a post asking for the charged attack to be an overhead strike, I believe it was one of my first posts on this forum.

@Manacraft

Fatshark’s response was to give us the ironhelm, a hammer with a cleaving effect that in return had a harder time reaching breakpoints and a (IMHO) worse move set. It’s not my cup of tea, but it’s nice for the people who like it, so I thought the matter was probably settled, at least as far as Fatshark was concerned.

For the meta at the time I absolutely despised this response. It felt very disappointing to have the problems with one weapon brushed off and have to make a compromise with a new weapon with less damage. Maybe I’m still stuck up on that point.

@Manacraft

Fast forward to patch 13, a patch where you hardly have to sneeze at a crusher to kill it because everything’s been buffed through the roof, and your thread arrives asking for a buff to the crusis hammer. I think that’s a bad idea because killing elites is quite frankly already easy as pie and doesn’t need to be any easier. Crusis has a more powerful charged attack than ironhelm, and if patch 13 is to be the standard for how easy it is to kill elites, then I think it’s fair to keep the crusis as is. In a world like that, we don’t need more powerful tools for killing elites (and that’s not even touching the topic of horde clear, where hammers also received significant buffs).

This is a wait and see for me. I probably should have made this post earlier. Pre patch 13 the Thunder Hammers were awful compared to what everyone else had for single target killing, excluding bosses. In that meta I think asking for normalized damage and cleave for the two of them, and maybe even a better buff seems a no brainer.

@Manacraft

The good news is that concern has now been somewhat alleviated by patch 14. It’s at least something that fatshark agrees that elites shouldn’t just fall over the second you look at them. Anyway, that brings us to the part about our different view on the whole crusis vs ironhelm situation:

For me how the Thunder Hammer preforms relies extremely heavily on the rest of the meta. If we’re absolutely melting everything, and the T Hammer can’t kill stuff fast enough its trash tier. If it takes some effort to bring down targets, and its running around one shotting everything than its god tier. And at the moment I don’t know which way FS wants to lean. I want the T Hammers to be very powerful and kill single targets fast in most cases.

@Manacraft

You see the ironhelm as being the straight up better choice. I think it’s probably crusis (though not by a particularly wide margin). You think that the crusis hammer needs a cleaving charged attack just to catch up to the ironhelm. I think that if you give the crusis hammer the cleaving attack that the ironhelm has, the ironhelm will fall out of favor to the point of hardly being used.

But since we probably can’t agree on that, then we should at least be able to agree that the crusis hammer has a more powerful charged attack. That’s fairly indisputable. This means that if you give the crusis a cleaving charged heavy, you’re moving the needle for what thunder hammers can do. It’s a buff, straight up. Do you honestly think that no one will subsequently ask for ironhelm buffs to get it up to par with the crusis? If not, why? Moving one piece moves another.

I said in my original post that I would want the charged attack damage between the 2 to be normalized, or at least more normalized with some differences. I still like my idea of Crucis having higher base damage on charged attacks and Ironhelm having less bass damage but a higher finesse modifier.

@Manacraft

h, and since we’re just theorycrafting here, whichever solution you prefer, I’d appreciate if it was one that doesn’t prevent charged attacks from working reliably with Until Death/Holy Revenant. It’s less of a problem than it used to be, but it’s still one of my pet peeves about the ironhelm.

Uh oh. I don’t think that’s happened to me before. Does the health regen sometimes only count the damage to the first target you cleave or something?

Also along with @Reginald I obsoletely despise the move set changes, however my new baby the Crusher has replaced my Ironhelm, which has gone into deep storage for the time being.

[omgsoysauce]

Today I used a crusher. I immediately thought how if Crucis had an overhead it would probably be easier to not miss priority targets. Probably.

In my mind I always thought the Crucis was like vermintide’s hammers. Ironhelm to me was like vt2’s halberd spamming light attack over and over – haven’t tried it in patch 13 or 14 but before both it couldn’t really do that. I could handle horde with both hammers, I just couldn’t really stomp the horde.

Anyway, if anything I’d like the Crucis to get an overhead heavy whenever charged up. Right now I’d rather use the Ironhlem just because it’s less frustrating. Thing is if Crucis wasn’t as frustrating to use I don’t think I’d go back to the Ironhelm then.

[Manacraft]

@dragomusic

For me how the Thunder Hammer preforms relies extremely heavily on the rest of the meta. If we’re absolutely melting everything, and the T Hammer can’t kill stuff fast enough its trash tier. If it takes some effort to bring down targets, and its running around one shotting everything than its god tier.

Yes and no. There has to be some standard (however rough) for what constitutes an overall healthy time to kill that is independent of weapons. Case in point, under patch 13 lots of weapons were melting everything (some still are), but that doesn’t make the thunder hammer trash tier. That’s just the wrong diagnosis. To me the timing of your post does a lot of work here, but maybe I’m reading more into it than I should.

@dragomusic

I want the T Hammers to be very powerful and kill single targets fast in most cases.

Fully agree.

@dragomusic

I said in my original post that I would want the charged attack damage between the 2 to be normalized, or at least more normalized with some differences. I still like my idea of Crucis having higher base damage on charged attacks and Ironhelm having less bass damage but a higher finesse modifier.

Depends on what you mean by “normalize” (that word is doing a lot of work here). In any case, I have my doubts about whether that’s enough of a difference, but hey, if Fatshark is open to experiment then so am I.

@dragomusic

Uh oh. I don’t think that’s happened to me before.

Step 1: Run ironhelm
Step 2: Have until death/holy revenant trigger
Step 3: Charge your hammer and look for something to bonk so you can heal
Step 4: Realize that because you’re running ironhelm, you need a target with sufficient hit mass
Step 5: Look around and see nothing but the scab bruiser that just backstabbed you
Step 6: Facepalm

Of course, nowadays holy revenant is limited to 25% of your health (about time that thing got nerfed too), so it’s less of an issue than it used to be, but it’s always left a bad taste in my mouth when running ironhelm.

@dragomusic

my new baby the Crusher has replaced my Ironhelm

Here is the weapon that I think might straight up force a change to thunder hammers. I absolutely need to do some playtesting with one of these, but alas, Brunt and Hadron are currently conspiring against me. But from what I’ve seen it looks very impressive indeed.

[dragomusic]

@Manacraft

Yes and no. There has to be some standard (however rough) for what constitutes an overall healthy time to kill that is independent of weapons. Case in point, under patch 13 lots of weapons were melting everything (some still are), but that doesn’t make the thunder hammer trash tier

Just experimented with the new knife with rending backstab and we now live in a world where a knife has a faster TTK on Ogryn enemies than Thunder Hammers.

Beyond that that, I agree and disagree. A weapon can still be good independent of the meta around it. However the less important that single target damage becomes, or the more other weapons can acheive that damage safer and or easier, the higher the opportunity cost of bringing the Thunder Hammers are. I guess maybe what I’m trying to come at is that the actual in game performance of the weapons comes down to the meta around them. If everyone is melting everything it won’t get much use or feel great.

@Manacraft

To me the timing of your post does a lot of work here, but maybe I’m reading more into it than I should.

Can you explain what you meant by this? I was meaning to make this post before they revealed the patch notes for this most recent balance patch, but I won’t be lying and say I wouldn’t like these changes to come to the Crucis as a replacement for what they did to the Ironhelm.

@Manacraft

Depends on what you mean by “normalize” (that word is doing a lot of work here). In any case, I have my doubts about whether that’s enough of a difference, but hey, if Fatshark is open to experiment then so am I.

By normalize I would want their heavy charged attacks to have similar if not exactly the same damage profile. In general it is weird to me that the Thunder Hammer family special attacks preform so differently from one another, when I don’t think that is the case for any other weapon than the Illisi.

@Manacraft

Step 1: Run ironhelm
Step 2: Have until death/holy revenant trigger
Step 3: Charge your hammer and look for something to bonk so you can heal
Step 4: Realize that because you’re running ironhelm, you need a target with sufficient hit mass
Step 5: Look around and see nothing but the scab bruiser that just backstabbed you
Step 6: Facepalm

Of course, nowadays holy revenant is limited to 25% of your health (about time that thing got nerfed too), so it’s less of an issue than it used to be, but it’s always left a bad taste in my mouth when running ironhelm.

Personally I never had or still have a problem with it. Single target enemes are almost always in reach with Fury/chastise now, or if neccassary I can kill a group of enemies. However you are right that it is more consistent to get it with the Crucis, especially if you got dropped to 1 from ranged attacks.

@Manacraft

Here is the weapon that I think might straight up force a change to thunder hammers. I absolutely need to do some playtesting with one of these, but alas, Brunt and Hadron are currently conspiring against me. But from what I’ve seen it looks very impressive indeed.

While it somewhat suffers against Crushers and Maulers it is everything I wanted out of a power maul. Way more consistent and strong performance over the T Hammers but with less burst damage, specifically against bosses. Even if the Ironhelm gets its moveset changes reverted I might just stick with the Crusher.

Hopefully you will be able to get one soon! From my experience any of the 3 impact blessings work fine, you just need Skullcrusher and good perks. Most importantly though it is incredibly fun to play, and it just “works” for me incredibly well.

I still remember when the Crusher first came out before we had Brunts and I had to wait over a month to try it out. What a mess Darktide launch was lol.

[omgsoysauce]

@Manacraft

Here is the weapon that I think might straight up force a change to thunder hammers. I absolutely need to do some playtesting with one of these, but alas, Brunt and Hadron are currently conspiring against me. But from what I’ve seen it looks very impressive indeed.

It’s funny. Crusher to me feels like old vermintide hammers – maybe it’s coz of the impact blessing? I dunno but now its sweeping heavy attack flings and kills a good chunk of horde.

More curious how people think Crusher compares to Eviscerator.

[TwiceBorn]

The fact that Crusher’s crowd-control combo starts with a faster Light attack (compared to Eviscerator starting with a slower Heavy attack) makes it feel more comfortable to use on hordes. I’m not sure if it kills quite as quickly as an Eviscerator, but I prefer it over the Eviscerator when dealing with hordes.

Eviscerator also relies on its revved attacks to deal damage to single targets, whereas most of the Crusher’s damage comes from nailing targets in the head with its unpowered Heavy 1. As a result, the Crusher feels safer to use.

Overall I’m absolutely adoring the Crusher.

[Dumlefudge]

@TwiceBorn

compared to Eviscerator starting with a slower Heavy attack

Have you tried opening with the push attack? My go-to is push attack → heavy → light → light; depending on how long you charge the heavy, you will have recovered the stamina cost of the push when you repeat the chain.

@TwiceBorn

nailing targets in the head with its unpowered Heavy 1

Push attack, light 2, heavy 1. Go forth and crush skulls I haven’t looked at the datamine for the specifics, and push attacks aren’t listed ingame, but the push attack headshot multiplier is really really good

I feel like the Crusher is almost like a +CC -DMG variant of an Eviscerator.

[Manacraft]

@dragomusic

A weapon can still be good independent of the meta around it. However the less important that single target damage becomes, or the more other weapons can acheive that damage safer and or easier, the higher the opportunity cost of bringing the Thunder Hammers are.

I’ll just add that the conclusion can go both ways. Let’s take the knife, since you bring it up: Do we think the admittedly good TTK of the knife vs ogryns compared to thunder hammer is because 1) the hammer is weak or 2) the knife and rending/bleeding/backstabbing are strong? The difference matters.

Anyway, I think we pretty much agree here and are mostly talking theory at this point.

@dragomusic

Can you explain what you meant by this?

Merely that under patch 13 I would have probably said no to most things that made killing elites easier, especially when you’re talking about sticking them on a weapon that already received substantial buffs. There was no headroom for it. But like I said, things are looking up on that front.

[TwiceBorn]

The Eviscerator does have a very good push attack, but the Crusher is nice for being able to put out a quick space-clearing attack without having to use up stamina.

[Reginald]

@omgsoysauce

More curious how people think Crusher compares to Eviscerator.

Generaly speaking safer to use against elites and in general a strong weapon. Indignatus is for sure slower against hordes by quite a bit compared to a good micro-Eviscerator. But its very strong for handling ragers and packs of elites in a safe if not super expedient manner. The micro-eviscerator is deadlier but less safe in general. They favor different play styles and I really like both.

@dragomusic

Just experimented with the new knife with rending backstab and we now live in a world where a knife has a faster TTK on Ogryn enemies than Thunder Hammers.

Darktide is a game, with 40k skins in it but absolutely stupid balance.
-Plasma revolver
-thunder knife
Amazing.

[dragomusic]

@Manacraft

I’ll just add that the conclusion can go both ways. Let’s take the knife, since you bring it up: Do we think the admittedly good TTK of the knife vs ogryns compared to thunder hammer is because 1) the hammer is weak or 2) the knife and rending/bleeding/backstabbing are strong? The difference matters.

It is 100% because the knife is overtuned, I just brought it up because it is funny.

@Manacraft

Anyway, I think we pretty much agree here and are mostly talking theory at this point.

Talking theory is fun imo.

@Reginald

Darktide is a game, with 40k skins in it but absolutely stupid balance.
-Plasma revolver
-thunder knife
Amazing.

I live in a state of constant pain.

[omgsoysauce]

@Reginald

Darktide is a game, with 40k skins in it but absolutely stupid balance.
-Plasma revolver
-thunder knife
Amazing.

Requesting a thunder frying pan please.

[tfunknationtown]

@dragomusic

I live in a state of constant pain.

@omgsoysauce

Requesting a thunder frying pan please.

Coming with 5 dodges, infinite cleave and a special activation krak grenade esq explosion next patch.

It’s pushattack will cleave and so will it’s follow ups.

[nCmixam]

@Reginald

Darktide is a game, with 40k skins in it but absolutely stupid balance.
-Plasma revolver
-thunder knife
Amazing.

Tbh power knives are a thing in 40k. But revolver, yeah… It’s basically a pocket sniper at this point.