Passives or talents affecting range

Warhammer: Vermintide 2 Feedback
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So recently because of the zealot topics, i have seen alot of people argue that zealot’s passive shouldn’t affect his ranged weapons. The argument that i see the most is that it’s not his identity or that he can do some insane damage on range just bodyshotting everything. I’ve been trying to understand the reasoning behind removing it, but this mostly leads to going off topic in other threads, which is why i created this one. So i can ask all my questions, give maybe some counter arguments and then read other arguments from advocaters.

Let’s start with all the current passive’s that affect ranged weapons. (that i know off)(5% unlisted passives probably work aswell, but its hard to test that one)

Mercenary:

  • Paced strikes. (maybe this is just a placebo, but i feel like i shoot faster on repeater)

Zealot:

  • Fiery faith
  • Holy fervour

Slayer:

  • Throphy hunter

Witch hunter captain:

  • Witch hunt
  • animosity (yes technically an ultimate, the crit chance boost works on ranged)
  • killing shot

Unchained:

  • Slave to aqshy (no slowdown on overcharge)

Next up, talents:

Mercenary:

  • Helborgs tutelage
  • The more the merrier

Footknight:

  • Have at thee
  • Staggering force
  • Comrades in arms

Zealot:

  • Castigate
  • Unbending purpose
  • Flaglant zeal
  • Flaiths flurry

Ironbreaker:

  • Drengbarazi oath

Handmaiden:

  • Focussed spirit
  • Dance of blades

Shade:

  • Cruelty
  • Exploit weakness
  • Exquisite huntress

Unchained:

  • frenzied flame

Also something i wanna talk about is traits.
Some of these things here i think people find issue in, is purely due to traits. For example: witch hunter crit chance on ult affecting his range wouldn’t bother people if it didnt synergise so well with scrounger.

So what should be changed. traits or the passive affecting range, in this whc case?

Another argument i’ve seen alot is ‘career identity’.
So for example: “zealot’s passive should not affect his range, because he is a melee career”. But what does this mean? how do we know that? do we know that due to his passives? do we know that due to his talent tree?

Some questions i wanna ask to get the discussion started:

  • Whats the reason to remove it from zealot only?
    - Is it because he has power and attack speed affecting it?
    - Is it because he has a melee identity and it clashes with it? If so, how do you know his identity?

  • Players that are advocating for removal of zealot’s passive, Are you advocating for only zealot or also for other careers? why those careers and not the others? What makes it fine on “x” but not on “y”?

I honestly wanna know peoples reasoning. I have been talking about removing pyro’s crit affecting her melee a while back, and alot of people have responded and i’ve honestly changed my mind. I hope we can have the same discussion about certain passives/ talents affecting ranged weapons.

Also a passive is stronger then a talent. because you have to choose a talent and potentionally lose out on other talents, but in my eyes a talent that affects both ranged and melee, cruelty for example, is very close to a passive affecting melee and range.
Also traits are a very big part of this, so i’m fine discussing this aswell.

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don’t worry, it’s not placebo; attack speed does affect the fire rate :^)

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I think whether or not talents should work with both melee and ranged should be decided on a per basis.

Unless a talent/passive specifies it’s melee or ranged only, like Unchained’s Unstable Strength I’m fine with it affecting both.

Fatshark have clearly shown it’s something they acknowledge as they removed ranged crits from Fervency, so it probably just depends on balance.

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At first I wanted to answer with game logic. Then I noticed that it is impossible to create a logically consistent argument over all cases. Which leads to the problem that we would have to evaluate it on a case-by-case base.

In the end it would, for me, probably down to two points: subjectivity and balance (also subjective as any two days in this forum will tell you). So in the end we can discuss it up and down but it mostly stays up to each and everyone what he thinks.

To give some examples:

  • I don’t think Paced Strikes should affect range because it is called Paced Strikes which I would interpret as striking someone in melee (language-wise you can also strike in distance). Also the trigger condition is melee-based (although we also have specific talents where it is intended that melee actions benefit range). On the other hand I have no issue with Focussed Spirit affecting range to because I can somehow explain that a better focus improves your aiming skills and like-wise damage. So, for me, naming and description has an influence on how I perceive a talent.

  • I do think Fiery Faith should not affect Zealot’s range play. Argument here is for the most part balancing as he shouldn’t have strong range atop of all his other buffs. Also narrative-wise I perceive Zealot as someone frantic and a powered-up range play does not fit with that.

  • I do think that Witch Hunt is okay to influence ranged play because it is an action focussing on a specific enemy. As such the characters are more prone to kill it. So here it is narrative-wise fitting. On the other hand Killing Shot shouldn’t affect range. Then again, I could live very well without Killing Shot at all. Mainly for balancing questions.

  • Drengbarazi Oath would also make sense to me as you take pressure from team mates and as such they can concentrate on the enemies better, like a moral push.

  • I still think for Pyromancer that the passive should only affect range as I perceive her as the mainly ranged focused career for Sienna (mostly due to the active skill) and that giving to much of crit chance to melee is broken on any career.

Just as examples for some of them. Like I said, in the end it is more or less subjectivity how I perceive a talent and how I see it in terms of balance.

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It’s because Zealot has the survival of a tanky Career, melee DPS output of a solely melee Career (Slayer/GK), while also gaining 42.5% Power to his Ranged Weapon BEFORE Item stats, with a potential of 82.5%.

  • 82.5% Power on Ranged, on a Career that should be mainly Melee (107.5% with Hunter, 127.5% with Hunter + FF).
  • No downtime on his Power
  • Needs less ammo, because of the amount of Power
  • It’s one of the factors that makes him so overly versatile. Weapons (Horde clear/Elite clear/CC/Boss damage), Def stats, and his Ranged Power

Power is the best Stat for Range, unless there’s some breakpoint you’ve reached and you’re only shooting one type of enemy, which is unlikely. Even running Crit for Hunter is done because you want more Power.

FK and IB’s (these are the two most similar with the same issue) Ranged Power is offset by the fact that they don’t do most the highest Melee DPS in the game, like Zealot.

FK with Shotgun does a lot of damage though. Merc loses too much Power, as he relies on a specific circumstance to reach his Power/Cleave Potential. FK can Stagger an Elite with Shotgun.

Pyro is too RNG, Hunter makes her extremely good, but she also doesn’t have the ridiculous sustained Melee damage nor survival of Zealot.

The other Careers Melee =/= Range synergy isn’t as strong, nor as constant as FK/Merc/Zealot.

Also, I’m not sure why you’re trying to mystify the fact that he’s mainly a Melee Career. Clearly his Talents and Passives point to him being a Melee Career. Even if he’s hybrid, it means his stats are too versatile, if he’s supposed to be a Ranged Career, he has too much Melee Power.

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I hold the same opinion. Any careers passive’s or talents you think should be changed currently? (also i probably missed alot of talents and stuff affecting ranged). Also why?

Yes i think this is pretty accurate, its a balance discussion and balance is prety subjective after all.
I just think its weird how everyone jumped on zealot’s passive recently while there are so many things affecting range. so i was wondering why? why exactly zealot of all things?

Just to clarify, i don’t know if it gives ranged power to allies, i assume it will. i only looked at ib in this case.

But is it broken? Does it affect balance more then other passives/talents affecting ranged? I would argue if witch hunt affects ranged then every other career can get increased power, like huntsman for example. so thats huntsman’s kit + 20% dmg increase, thats something that has a huge impact on balance in my opinion. The only arguments being that whc is not in every lobby, and that there is a cooldown on tagging.

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First off all. lets look at the numbers.

Zealot has 30% base power increase with his passive.
Adding 7.5% with enhanced power and 5% with unbending purpose, which equals to 42.5% power increase on his ranged.

Then we can add properties. Let’s stack armoured/skaven. 20% armoured/20% skaven, which is like 40% skaven or 20% armoured power increase.

Then we can add ultimates and traits.
+25% with hunter
or
25% with barrage.
+20% with faiths flurry.

So yes technically he can reach 127.5% by stacking all the above. but This is greatly missleading. Lets look at a more realistic view of this.

30% with his passive + 20% skaven + 20% armoured. This is more realistic in a game. Choosing hunter gives up any sort of ammo regen, also difficult to proc, unless choosing smite, which removed 5% power from unbending. Faiths flurry can be choosen, but is only active after 10 hits, which is only reachable with Bop, and you most likely not have any ammo left to make use of this. Barrage is the same as faiths flurry, but a bit less. Also the properties only work on certain factions and types of enemies, so its not a 40% constant power uptime. Also you will run out of ammo very quickly, yes i can empty my Bop into a boss with a strenght pot, but all my ammo is gone after i did that. If thats a worthy trade off depends on the player.

So yes, on paper he can reach 127% ranged power, but how much of that is consistently available and what sacrifices does he have to make? like taking smite or unbending instead of castigate?

I do agree that 30% base ranged power is strong, but please don’t artificially boost it with numbers like 127% when in reality thats barely useable.

I also do agree the combination of zealot currently is very strong. Strong defense and strong offense, but i don’t think removing his passive from affecting his range will nerf him at all. When i am talking about zealot being too strong, i mostly am talking about his melee and tanky side, i don’t really mind him being able to oneshot bodyshot a special. i think the fix for that is in ammo regen talents and ammo being found around the map, but thats just a very subjective opinion of mine.

Yes i know, i wasn’t including pyro into this discussion. It was mostly to show that i had changed my mind about her and that i would like to have a similar discussion about passives, but now regarding to ranged instead of melee.

I am not trying to mistify his identity. if i did, then i didn’t meant to. I was purely asking how you can find a careers identity. is it trough his passives or is it trough his talents? thats all. And if people think zealot shouldn’t have ranged power due to him being primarly melee, then i think they should be consistent and have other melee primary careers also remove their passives affecting ranged. Unless its a discussion about balance + career identity, which it is currently. Then its different.

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I don’t really know. Take Killing Shot for example, yes it affects ranged but how often does it really make an impact on gameplay? The same can be said for Zealots Fiery Faith, I have melee out 95% of the time, so the whole Zealot being OP/broken because power affects ranged seems overly exaggerated to me.

I’m much more interested in seeing reworks and fundamental problems being resolved.
I see where you’re coming from though “If x career has their buffs restricted to only x or y, then why does this career not follow the same rules?”

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honestly I’m indifferent on Zealot’s power, my main problem is his interactions with team heals are just kinda whack and some of his talents (5% power lmao) are also kinda whack

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I was off by 5%, mb. I wasn’t including Unbending.

I don’t think pointing to the potential is artificially boosting them. I was off by 5%, but the 122.5% is doable, and works as a Boss killer, or 100%. Usually with a STR Pot. Can work for CW or SV Patrols too. It’s completely doable if timed right. That’s the build I play on him on normal Cata anyway. As long as you have enough ammo for the initial barrage it’s fine.

The point of it is that I don’t know a single Ranged Career that can reach that Power.

With Ranged Power being the strongest stat for Ranged, that’s a good point to make. Even his Passive 70%, if he wants it, is a lot.

If they added a Blunderbus to Saltz, they would actually have to lock it off of Zealot, because of how strong it would be. FK has already shown how silly it is.

If they change that, it will force them to look at how else he’s strong.

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To get off-topic in an off-topic discussion: It also goes in the other direction. Ranged traits affecting melee, Barrage or Hunter anyone?

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Traits aren’t off topic. Traits are a big part of this topic, i don’t mind at all discussing this here :).

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Buffing ranged needs to have some kind of sensible logic thrown in there somewhere to sit well with me. A pistol doesn’t fire more explosively, more powerfully and more accurately purely because the Zealot is pumped. A pistol has a set damage due to the action of hammer/blackfire etc. Similarly a crossbow doesn’t get more powerful purely because someone is more muscly.

So, here is my reason for not buffing pistols damage at ranged on anyone - a pistol has a set amount of damage. Improving accuracy or chance of a critical hit is something slightly different and I can see a witch hunter gaining accuracy by being “in the zone”. Speed potions should affect reload time, but with something like the Rep gun, it fires at max speed anyhow.

Sienna Unchained actually should get her buffs to affect ranged, as the magic is improved by her overcharge.

I’m in favour of HS Manbow getting some buffs to ranged somehow as Kruber has to physically pull it back.

Traits like +20% vs armour might be explained by the pistol having extra rifling in the barrel or modifications to the build to make it armour penetrating.

Having such an exacting means of changing the ranged buffs and damage for each weapon on each class would be a logistical and coding nightmare however so I can understand why there are more wide ranging measures in place.

Zealot should have his ranged reigned in by a massive amount in my opinion as he can almost headbutt bullets out of the way to get to a gunner so why does he get the huge buffs to ranged too?

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This is a video-game.

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In that case I’d like to shoot a lazer out of my Tallywhacker that insta kills Nurgloth because reasons,

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I just think sacrificing castigate, smiter, and ranged ammo traits is enough, it hurts his melee side while boosting his ranged side. The only thing is smite and being able to proc hunter reliably, but i think its mostly used with scrounger anyway.

I just disagree with your numbers as on paper it’s alot, but in reality you don’t have 127% up for the entire time, you have 30% while also having 20 or 40% against a certain group or enemy type.
Also i mostly see ranged used on specials or monks/zerkers, and unloading 1 entire clip into them is fine in my opinion, it hurts you later on. I think the issue here is mostly the ammount of ammo available in game or ranged regen traits, and zealot being not risky at all.

Just to put everything together: You just argue that zealot shouldn’t get acces to ranged power because of balance. It should be brought more in line with ranged careers and removing that is the easiest option, And that he has acces to too much of everything too easily.

I’m argueing in this case that its fine because he has to make trade offs, to reach his full ranged potential, and that the issue of him being too tanky + too powerfull + too strong range, can be fixed by just adjusting some talents and making him more risky, for example, while keeping his passive ranged power.

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I’m confused by your comment.

You think a pistol cannot fire more explosively, or more powerfully and more accurately because a career is pumped, but then you contradict yourself by saying its fine if whc can do it, because he is “in the zone”? Are those not both the same things?

It’s either weapons cannot be influenced by external sources.
Or they can be influenced by external sources.

I get the impression its mostly just a subjective issue you have with certain things and this isn’t tied to ‘power’ affecting ranged, and its mostly your idea of how a class should be or shouldn’t be. but i might be wrong.

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Accuracy can be defined and improved by the aim of the person holding the gun, and so any buffs to accuracy or chance of a crit are acting on the person rather than the weapon. You’re right in that I shouldn’t have used accuracy when it comes to the Zealot being pumped. Maybe he could be more accurate if he’s also pumped up. A gun’s power should be a set thing that cannot be improved by temporary buffs or a classes talents. A trait of the weapon might improve it’s power though.

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I disagree, especially because of the numbers. 30% before anything else, vs every enemy type in the game, on a mainly Melee Career, is enough for me to not want it on him. The 30% effecting both Melee and Range is an issue. Pure power is too strong of a stat to gain 30% of without any downside, other than standing still at the start of the match.

He gets Gutter Runner bodyshot with Crossbow, before Item stats.
He can get bodyshots on Gunners/Flamers with Crossbow with 10% over his original 30% Power.
He can get bodyshot on Gutter Runner with BoP with 20% over his original 30% Power.

He doesn’t require a tag for it.

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So accuracy can be changed because a career can have better aim or be more focussed/calm.
This i can understand.
But how can a career, whc, increase the weapons crit chance by being focussed?

Also a trait or property can be explained by using different ammunition, but can everything not be explained by this?

Also this is a game set in a fantasy universe, ofcourse there are gonna be unrealistic things. I’m just confused.

This is why i think you hold the same opinion as @Adelion has. Where it depends on how you personally view the career. example, zealot is more melee, so he shouldn’t have acces to it , also because is in blinding rage and that comes at the cost of his range.