Not really. There are a lot of possible and very easy fixes for Swift Slaying:
Add a “softcap” to the Attack Speed
Remove + Crit Chance from the property pool
Include downsides to Swift Slaying like gaining no THP or reduced stagger while it is active
Some of them could be applied right now without issues like a change of the calculation formula. But you are right that a larger rework of traits and properties would be more beneficial. Not like we have suggestions for most of this stuff out there.
Yes and no. It would help that Swift Slaying is not stupid anymore. But it is still a very boring buff and it wouldn’t help traits like Heroic Intervention.
I would also prefer a more dynamic solution to it like the “softcap” or actual downsides.
I actually had been brainstorming some ideas on how to “fix” certain traits.
But sadly, SotT got released and now I have to wait for the tidal waves to even out, so my words wouldn’t get drowned if I post them.
Edit:
Have an entire pile of them compiled in a single doc. (Different from the original I made in the Autumn of 2020)
What I meant was the underlying issue itself was difficult to fix. Like my own suggestion of a small nerf to SS and buffs/reworks to other traits, I don’t consider these fixes to the core issue. They fix the symptoms of a system that favours speed, mobility and damage over defense. It takes a massive amount of enemies before defense is really relevant, and damage is still of incredible value there.
Wouldn’t adding a cap mean players would just take SS and not other sources of attack speed? 15% would still be great value if SS’s values were directly nerfed. Even 10% would be.
Removing crit chance from the property pool sounds complicated to me. What happens to all the gear/weapons that have crit chance on them? Does WHC get pushed from meta to ultra-meta because of it? There’s more to a change like that.
I like the idea of downsides though. It’s self-contained/tidy and I think easy to implement, but I’m not a coder so I could be wrong.
Rant
If I had my way, SS would be removed because it’s still an unreliable system (so would pseudo-random crits, not sure what to replace them with though), the base attack speed of all weapons would be increased by 20%, enemies would no longer have periods where they don’t attack (so they would always be attacking as soon as they are within valid distance/slot, they still just stand there sometimes) and most weapons would receive a very large stagger strength nerf and small cleave nerfs, with exception for ones that specialise in those areas at the cost of other areas. Make horde enemy’s have a stagger resistance check instead of being auto staggered by everything. Reduce the cleave limit on standard and weaker pushes. That would make it actually difficult for a weapon like the Rapier to both frontline and murder an entire horde solo. Non-tanks careers would receive less cooldown from taking damage. AoE damage would have far less stagger. Make it not possible to avoid all attacks from a horde solo without having to block at least some of them. But it’s not going to go my way.
You remember the release days of Winds of Magic?
Stagger system was essentially what you suggested, and it was a complete disaster.
Combat became unresponsive, most weapons became completely useless, and every horde felt like a wall death (and I am not talking about Beastmen. This problem was with Rotbloods too, but in lesser extent with Skaven.)
Yes, some people liked it, because game became more difficult overnight, but the vast majority of people hated it with such passion, the fire was visible on the horizon across the glove (okay, I am exaggerating, but people still did not like it)
I was one of those who despised the Stagger System when it was introduced during the Winds of Magic Beta (that and other issues like the incompetent decisions revolving around Weaves and the Incomplete Beastmen - which are worse now due to Chaos Wastes having only Bannermen to spawn from during certain events in groups of 4-6+ irony rears it’s ugly head yes Dark Omens?).
Back then this change made the gameplay a super slog and exaggerated the problems with Hyper Density and to me it pretty much emphasized the absolute need in having a shield for frontline bashing / pushing while some other heroes do the damage - any other team composition would probably get steam rolled. By the time you dealt with one horde it felt like you were onto the next one made up of a chunky meat wall.
I have also been repeatedly frustrated at how Fatshark continues to blithely ignore archaic, dust covered Properties, Traits and some Talents that should be buffed or completely changed so that people will feel that there are some actually good options out there rather then the usual stats / traits that are picked nearly every single time. Winds of Magic? Ignored. Chaos Wastes? Ignored but added some new traits just to mock the players showing that they could but they simply won’t.
I feel like the way enemy AI, level design, difficult increases that revolve around stat bloating and higher enemy density regarding hordes and ambient spawns all factor into how some weapons or playstyles glaringly shine more so then others that become more dim the higher the difficulty is. Is Vermintide 2 supposed to feel like Lord of the Rings gritty Balin’s Tomb fight or The Hobbit’s ridiculous goblins getting steamrolled chase scene - I feel like the Stagger System wanted it to be like the first example but Fatshark didn’t factor in the problems of high enemy density creating a World War Z literal wave of zombies situation. To me this kinda makes me wonder that the game isn’t really sure which version of combat it wants to be.
Generally, I agree that the disparity between equipment and talents is frequently too high.
Being able to delete a lord with a single lucky roll and a few seconds of hits from just two players is exhilarating when it happens once, but it gets old extremely fast.
Now, playing CW, the rogue-lite nature hides some of the issues, and a certain disparity is desired. But there’s still a lot of talents that basically aren’t picked.
Meanwhile, after a few months break and with a communcating, but not really coordinated team, I feel myself comfortably at home in Cata the may I would have in Legend in early 2020. The game’s unquestionably gotten easier, and not always in only the right places.