Powersword Megathread + POLLS

Warhammer 40,000: Darktide Gameplay Feedback
1

There’s a ton of people discussing the Powersword due to the controversial nerfs in Patch #7. I am obviously one of them. This thread is intended to serve as a locus of polling and opinion statements. Please use this thread for discussion:

General consensus from the above thread and the polls in it is that the power sword was definitely OP before, but the nerfs were too hard. A related thread explores the place of power weapons in Darktide and proposes some resolutions.

In this thread we find in the polls that many of the weapons, power weapons included and no doubt Powerswords chief among them, players do not believe the weapons truly capture the spirit or aesthetic or expectations of Power Weapons. However players seem quite split between a full on reversion of the Powersword nerfs to some other rework.

It seems to me there’s still questions to answer so I wanted to create a thread that will parse that out. In this thread I will do four things:

  1. Create polls on the playerbase’s expected role for the powersword in Darktide
  2. Create polls for the playerbase’s preferred proposals for nerfing, buffing or reworking the powersword
  3. Create polls on the feel, style and aesthetics of using the power sword
  4. Describing and aggregating the various proposals and linking to them if I can.
    Please feel free to message me links to your proposals in other threads and I will drop them in below and add a poll for them.

I will be creating a LOT of polls to give this thread the necessary flexibility to add new proposals based on community feedback.

How to use these polls:
Vote in every one!
You can vote for multiple ideas you like!
Please make a post after voting indicating your top 3 proposal choices and any commentary you like!
Note: This will allow you to edit your choices later if someone proposes a super cool idea no one thought of yet.

Role and Purpose

Should powerweapons be the “best” melee weapons

  • Yes
  • No
  • Yes, but with counterbalancing weaknesses
0 voters

What role/niche should the Powersword have compared to all other weapons

  • Generalist
  • Horde Clear
  • Specialist Killing
  • Elite Killing
  • Ogryn Killing
  • Armor Killing
  • Stagger and Stun
0 voters

What was the pre-nerf Powersword best at

  • Generalist
  • Horde Clear
  • Specialist Killing
  • Elite Killing
  • Ogryn Killing
  • Armor Killing
  • Stagger and Stun
0 voters

What is the post Patch #7 Powersword best at

  • Generalist
  • Horde Clear
  • Specialist Killing
  • Elite Killing
  • Ogryn Killing
  • Armor Killing
  • Stagger and Stun
0 voters

Execution

Do you like the toggle mechanic for the powersword’s charged attacks in general?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

Do you like how often you have to toggle the Powersword?

  • Yes, it feels good
  • No, too much repetitive clicking
0 voters

Aesthetics and Feel

Did the Powersword meet your expectations of a 40K Powersword before the nerfs in Patch #7

  • Yes
  • No
  • Kinda
0 voters

Did the Powersword feel good to use before the nerfs in Patch #7

  • Yes
  • No
  • Kinda
0 voters

Does the Powersword meet your expectations of a 40K Powersword after Patch #7

  • Yes
  • No
  • Kinda
0 voters

Does the Powersword feel good to use after Patch #7

  • Yes
  • No
  • Kinda
0 voters

Do you like using the powersword unpowered?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

Do the graphical effects of the powersword being on look appealing to you?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

Balance

should the powercycler blessing be reworked or removed because it makes balancing the powersword too hard

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

Proposals

Proposal 1: REVERT
Totla reversion of all changes made to the powersword in patch #7

Would you be happy if proposal 1 were adopted?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

Proposal 2: Flat Profile w/ overcharge special

  1. The power sword is always powered on when drawn and makes a power down sound when holstered
  2. The damage profile to enemies is flat. It does the same damage to crushers that it does to basic infantry. It can be used against any target with the same effectiveness.
  3. It has similar cleave damage distribution as it does now.
  4. Exact damage numbers can be played with for balance, but I am thinking in the range of 200 for heavy and 100 for light.
  5. Special action overcharges the power sword. The subsequent swing will be a thrust or overhead depending on pattern, dealing greater damage base (400?) intended for single target work.

Would you be happy if proposal 2 were adopted?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

Proposal 3 Enhanced Flat Profile w/ Overcharge
Same as rework 1 but is intended to slightly strengthen the power sword at a cost of lower usability

  1. Flat damage profile has slightly higher base numbers
  2. Slightly reduce swing speed of the sword to compensate
  3. Add a mechanic such that the power sword is drawn from the hip in an unpowered state and must be toggled on manually by the player. If not toggled then it will use normal unpowered swing damage tables
  4. Once powered on the special action converts to an ovecharge mechanic as in rework 1
  5. The powersword is automatically powered off when holstered.

Would you be happy if proposal 3 were adopted?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

Proposal 4: Battery Mechanic
Described by several other persons.

  1. Use either an ammo or overheat style mechanic to limit the number of powered swings that can be used at a given time.
    No-Fun Mechanics (Power Sword)
    Power Sword Rework (After Patch 7)
    No-Fun Mechanics (Power Sword) - #16 by weeping.moon

Would you be happy if proposal 4 were adopted?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

Proposal 5: Revert & Change swing combos

  1. Revert the changes to power charge
  2. Change all attacks to favor less horizontal patterns
    Darktide's Melee Weapon Design has Failed - #8 by weeping.moon

Would you be happy if proposal 5 were adopted?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

Proposal 6: Revert w/ always on VFX

  1. Revert charged swings to 2
  2. Display graphics and visual and audio feedback as if the power sword is always on
  3. Make no stats changes at all.

Would you be happy if proposal 6 were adopted?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters
2 Likes
2

I seem to have hit some kind of poll limit or formatting issue that broke Proposal 7, 8 and 9. I have thus split the thread into a second post. I have added Proposal 8 and Proposal 9.

Proposal 7: Always On w/ light rework

Would you be happy if proposal 7 were adopted?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

Proposal 8: Stamina use while toggled on

  1. When toggled on the stamina bar will drain at some rate or while swung

Would you be happy if proposal 8 were adopted?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters
3

Proposal 9: Keep Patch #7 Nerfs w/ Always On VFX

  1. Leave the power sword as is in Patch #7
  2. Display graphics and visual and audio feedback as if the power sword is always on
  3. Make no stats changes at all.

Would you be happy if proposal 9 were adopted?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

Proposal 10: Revert swing count but add activation cooldown

  1. Revert the swing count to 2
  2. 4 with power cycler
  3. Add a 2~ second cooldown between activations

Would you be happy if proposal 10 were adopted?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

Proposal 11: Stamina cost on powered swings

  1. When activated the powersword costs stamina to swing
  2. It costs less stamina for light attacks
  3. more stamina for heavy attacks

Would you be happy if proposal 11 were adopted?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

Proposal 12: Revert, reduce stagger and rework Power Cycler

  1. Revert the changes in Patch #7
  2. Nerf power sword stagger
  3. Rework power cycler so that it activates the sword automatically if not used for 5-10 seconds

Would you be happy if proposal 12 were adopted?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

Proposal 13: Remove and replace

  1. Remove powerswords from the game
  2. replace with burning blades or an alternative 40K weapon of lower quality or grade
    Powersword Megathread + POLLS - #30 by xxWeaSeL242xx

Would you be happy if proposal 13 were adopted?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters

Proposal 14: “Keep It Simple”

  1. Standardize the number of charged hits to 2. No extra charged attacks for chaining heavy attacks.
  2. Power Cycler blessing now has a T3 version that adds +1 charged hit.
  3. Power Cycler T4 reduced to +1 charge instead of +2, but now also doubles the duration a sword can stay charged after activation.
  4. Henceforth if the power sword is deemed to be underpowered or overpowered it would be adjusted by changing the damage/stagger/cleave values instead of the number of charged hits.

Would you be happy if proposal 14 were adopted?

  • Yes
  • No
0 voters
4

Well… Polls little biased

I want a balanced weapon.
Something that feel like a PS but with a cooldown between 2 activations.
It means 2 (base) to 4 (with PC) swings but with a cooldown of 2 or 3 seconds.

1 Like
5

I’m happy to make them less biased if you can give me specific improvements. I did do my best.

I will add your proposal

6

I would have asked if the nerf was a good move from FS.
And on this, I would answer yes.
On your specific question, I don’t know what I could answer.
The PS is not fun to use without PC, but with PC the Powersword is too strong.

The PS isn’t, actually, underpowered. It is an average weapon without PC and an OP weapon with PC.

You cannot remove a blessing that is in the game.
I said it about force sword that have too many blessings in their pool… but unfortunately once a blessing is in the game, you cannot remove it.

However, if we keep current change, you could envisage to lower the PC to just +1 swing. In my opinion, this is not the solution as the base of 1 swing is really hard for people that have been used to a weapon that was above the qualification of overpowered…

1 Like
7

That question was asked in the community thread already and the answer was uniformly no, the nerf was too harsh. But the PS was OP.

I’m not trying to rehash old discussion here but give clarity to the feedback the polls in other threads have already provided.

1 Like
8

Fine… as you said… so many threads and discussions…

I am not even sure that the players that voted, remember what they voted.
Honestly, my opinion has changed about the nerfs

1 Like
9

Elite cleaving should always be a less than ideal damage imo. The stagger and damage of CA axe heavies is just not sweet. Darktide pretty much disallows this as a rule so seeing it not only provide damage near the middle-high tier of damage but multiplied by a unique ability to cleave them was just not going to be balanced.

Or hitting 8 targets in a swing and the last guy hit is still hurt for more damage than target 1 on the catachan.

I’m just really tired of dedicating so much energy to one weapon, streamline the animation cancel window to be more like a chainsword, remove power cycler and make it 4 lights or 2 heavies.

4 Likes
10

I just don’t get this dedication to the OP. What comes closet to what a PS should be, in my opinion, is Proposal 2. But WHY keep the ridiculous cleave? And WHY the ridiculous Overcharged mechanic? You realise with a flat damage profile dealing 100 damage with Lights and 200 with Heavies it would STILL be infinitely better than the Catachan Sword?

Lore? That’s a nope…
“Fun and interesting”? What’s fun and interesting about face-rolling a game where the actual gameplay is to challenge yourself to survive a TIDE of enemies?

I just don’t get it…

2 Likes
11

The problem with the power sword is simply that Fatshark designed themselves into a corner when they decided that every single weapon is balanced only against all the other weapons in the same slot. You simply can’t put a power sword in the game that is every bit as awesome as a power sword ought to be when it somehow has to be balanced against a literal latrine shovel and your character cannot make up the difference anywhere else in the kit.

5 Likes
12

gotta say that I specifically noted that I didn’t want it to be a constant drain, but a per-use cost, like a shove. It would be rather bad if it was a constant drain. Considering the bonus stagger and damage that activation enables, bonus stamina use just makes sense with gameplay flow. But, nobody likes it anyways, so whatevas.

13

Help me get a better understanding of it and i’ll just add another poll, if you want.

14

For me a healthy balance on the highest difficulty is the most inportant thing.
Way more important than if something is lore accurate.
Im not a big fan of constantly having to activate a weapon though.
Breath of the wild has a mechanic that for example fire weapons do fire damage only for a few swings before they have to recharge. Maybe use that for power sword?

Totally agree here.

I woulnd’t mind if powersword was an especially strong melee weapon if as a drawback you were for example not be able to take a ranged weapon with you. Though kinda strage on the ranged carrer…

2 Likes
15

you don’t really have to, but it’s just a per-swing stamina use while toggled on. Light attacks would use less stamina than heavies (like 1stam for a heavy, 1/2 stam for a light, prob more for a heavier weapon like the hammer or evis). Pretty simple. If somebody wanted to get more use out of it, they could have +stam and regen on their curios/weapon (which would be useful for more than just powered attacks too, but does give greater than the near-zero incentive that currently exists for bonus stamina). Makes it so vet can’t ultra spam it, and zealot would get better use out of them. Blessings can be made to influence the stamina interaction with the activated state, like partial stamina refund on elite hits, or a version of thrust (that stacks with thrust) that uses more stamina for greater power depending on how long you charge an attack, or blocking increases the power of your next attack depending on how much damage was blocked over a few seconds, etc. This would also eliminate the need for a self stun timer on hammers.

16

I will consolidate my experience playing with the Power Sword post-changes here, after having completed two rounds of weekly contracts with it requiring both 750 scab/dreg melee kills:

Decent Stat Distribution but Unoptimized Perks/Blessings

  • The weapon was moderately effective, about as powerful (if not slightly more) as most of Veteran’s melee options but generally outclassed by more “meta” options. More importantly however, it was frustrating and not very fun to use.

Optimized Perks/Blessings, but no Power Cycler

  • Weapon was very effective without feeling imbalanced, and could deal with most situations reasonably well. Required playing around blessings to get the most out of them (I used Brutal Momentum and Slaughterer). Relatively complicated to use with a high risk/high reward style of gameplay. I personally found this very fun, but I can see why it wouldn’t be for everybody.

Power Cycler

  • Weapon felt nearly exactly as it did pre-patch without Power Cycler. Could still make a strong argument for being the strongest melee weapon in the game. Absolutely decimated everything up to and including regular Damnation runs with very little effort. Clearly more powerful than a good, optimized sword without this blessing.

  • Had some noticeable trouble dealing with rapidly changing situations at the absolute highest difficulties (high intensity shock troop gauntlet) due to the activation mechanic and low mobility slowing down the weapon, making it feel moderately balanced at these levels.

As for changes, I’ve expressed before I’d prefer a re-work of the weapon. I’d prefer a version of the weapon that’s always on. In the weapon’s current state, the activation mechanic is necessary to keep it’s DPS in line, as powered attacks do incredibly high damage. From the beginning, the Power Sword has not met my expectations of how the weapon should function compared to my understanding of it in the lore, nor do I find it particularly engaging or fun to use to make up for this.

Regarding the suggestions at the top of this thread, I like Proposal 3 the most, but am also partial to Proposals 2 or 7. Unfortunately, even if FatShark does decide to fundamentally change the weapon, it’s likely those changes will take awhile to implement. It also seems that while the activation mechanic isn’t the most popular, pre-patch many people DID find the weapon fun to use and it DID at least moderately meet their expectations for what a Power Sword should be.

Short term, I absolutely would not revert the changes to the weapon. It was inarguably too strong before with Power Cycler. Instead, I would band-aid fix the weapon, allowing something like 2 activated heavy/3 activated light attacks before de-powering, or 3 heavy attacks/4 light attacks with Power Cycler (allowing you to alternate attacks to get optimal damage/patterns, increasing the complexity of the weapon). This would fit the attack patterns of the two Power Swords we have now decently well without overshadowing every other weapon in the game.

Personally I would reduce the number all of those activations mentioned above by 1, but I’m afraid this would make the weapon feel too clunky without Power Cycler to be fun for most people. I’d actually prefer to see a hit mass system, where activating the weapon would penetrate a certain amount of hitmass regardless of the number of swings before depowering. I’d increase armour penetration on unpowered swings to help compensate for this. Either way, Power Cycler is currently too strong of a blessing and the weapon should be less reliant on it to promote build diversity.

I actually agree with this statement, but for another reason. My personal opinion is that each weapon should be balanced with gameplay progression in mind, for example:

  • You start with dumpy, boring weapons like swords and axes. While you’re levelling you get access to cooler, stronger weapons iconic to 40k, like Chain and Power weapons, the Flamethrower, Force Staves, the Ripper Gun, etc. Unmodified, these weapons should be more powerful than their more basic counterparts, allowing the player to feel more powerful as they grow in level and rank.

  • As it hit level 30, experience progression stops and your gear becomes the main way to increase your power level. At this point, players will begin upgrading their favourite weapons (likely the iconic weapons listed above). Without too much investment, players should be able to see a flat increase in the weapon’s potential as they upgrade these weapons, as they’ll likely still lack resources and blessings and are just now hitting the game’s highest difficulties.

  • As the player’s skill and game knowledge continues to grow and they begin to better understand the underlying mechanics of the game, and as they’ve likely passively collected a large number of blessings for a variety of weapons, they may begin to re-evaluate the old, basic weapons they dismissed back when they were levelling their character.

  • At this point, they realise that specific blessing and perk combinations let them experiment with new playstyles that are impossible without them, as well as reach breakpoints that allows the weapon to truly shine in a particular niche. This is the true endgame of Darktide from a progression perspective, when suddenly even a basic sword or axe can feel as strong as an Eviscerator (should) and the player has an increased amount of weapon variety to play with.

Note that this does ultimately mean weapons are balanced against each other, but in different ways. This also means that weapons with a base high power shouldn’t receive as many powerful blessings as their more mundane counter-parts. While it’s okay to have blessings that take advantage of the weapon’s unique mechanics, these should be used to change the playstyle of the weapon, not confer a clear advantage over other, more general blessing choices.

For example, the Power Sword succeeds at this with the Sunder and Supercharge blessings. You can specialize the weapon towards horde clear or armour penetration by changing the blessings. In fact, Fatshark has been pretty successful at this in general with their weapon design, minus a few clear outliers and a lot of unfortunately mediocre weapons (which will hopefully be buffed in the future).

The Power Sword is one of these outliers. Having access to blessings like Power Cycler and Slaughterer (keeping in mind how difficult it is to obtain these) push the weapon into a tier that regular weapons (hell, even iconic weapons) can’t match. Since the same blessing can confer different increases for different weapons, moderating this should easily be possible.

Regardless of what changes Fatshark ultimately does make to the weapon, they should prioritize making the weapon fun for the average user who stumbles into it during the earlier stages of character progression while keeping the power increase these more powerful blessings can later give in check.

2 Likes
17

I suggested something in a thread couple days ago: leave the sword as is but add a tier 3 “power cycler” blessing that gives 1 more energized hit instead of 2, and that is easier to obtain because less rare than the tier 4. You should add this in the poll!

18

@Reginald gotta say I love your posts, and general input to balance discussions (I like your style).

Can you add my proposal to the polls? I’m talking about this, basically revert changes (and nerf stagger), remake Power Cycler into a Pre-activation buff.

19

Or make the ranged weapons and curios also have a power spectrum and you need to budget in the cost of those to make room for an ancient relic that really rips, whether it’s a power sword or a plasma gun.

Having that kind of balance lever would allow weapons that are supposed to be absolute monsters to be kind of OP without breaking the game.

2 Likes
20

I prefer the always-on version, but in my mind power swords have middling damage that deals flat damage to everything, has high’ish cleave on account on how the power field is described to work but little to no stagger.

1 Like