The Problems with Ogryn's Talent Tree (Lack of Flexibility and Unfun Talents)

[simpliv]

I started with Veteran in Patch 13, which was honestly a mistake. You can’t really appreciate the flexibility of Veteran’s Talents until you play the other Operatives.

Unfortunately, I feel like Ogryn conceptually suffers the most, and this is particularly derived from my disappointment in the right side of the tree both severely lacking synergies and focusing on mechanics that functionally don’t feel present in the game. On top of that, Ogryn weapons are made in a way to be incredibly inefficient with ammo, but extremely powerful in the correct circumstances. This tree does not really synergize with that kind of design—despite the fact that I find Point-blank Barrage to be a fun Combat Ability.

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Lack of Flexibility

One of the first hurdles that Ogryn builds face is their Blitz. You have to commit to either the right side or the left side for Rocks or Frag Bombs, as diverging away requires you to take extra Talents from above that you genuinely cannot afford to take if you want to reach to and upgrade the Ogryn Keystones in addition to taking necessary staples at the bottom.

I don’t think it’s inherently negative, but this results in less of a Talent ‘tree’ and more of a Talent ‘river’ where you’re forced to follow the tide.

The second hurdle continues the river into very enforced paths that will simultaneously inform your Aura and your Keystone.

The player is immediately locked out of a variety of Passives, a few of which I consider fun or really support how I play Ogryn overall. Unfortunately, I simply cannot play with what I’m given here due to the harsh separation of these branches.

If I commit to the right side, I can ONLY take those right-side Passives. Simultaneously I can only take the left side Passives. The only Combat Ability that gains access to both is Loyal Protector. It’s not fun or interesting to me.

Ironically the only time I really enjoy pathing around to fine-tune my build is at the very bottom, and that can be attributed to the fact that it shares a similar structure to Veteran’s Talents.

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Unfun Talents

I’ve spent quite a while fine-tuning and tweaking my right-side ranged-focused build with what little I’m given just to give up on playing the build entirely. It suffers from a variety of boring Passives that don’t really do anything interesting for you.

“Reloaded and Ready” was the first Talent that really stuck out like a sore thumb to me. It’s a very picky Talent in the sense that it absolutely does not play well with the Stubber.

In addition to this, it does not proc when “Point-blank Barrage” reloads your weapon, which is absolutely bizarre to me that something like this was overlooked. It immediately makes the Talent subpar due to its lack of synergy with the Combat Ability it’s functionally supposed to be used with.

I find the Aura “Coward Culling” to be shockingly bland, especially when it’s tethered to a mechanic that already feels like there’s no real way to maintain it on enemies. Despite the massive damage bonus attributed to it, it really does feel like a throwaway that you’re forced to take due to the lack of flexibility.

I can commit to the “Stay Close!” Aura in the middle, but then I have to forego Passives like “Pacemaker” and “Ammo Stash” that synergize better.

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The left side has a few of its own problems, including a few Passives that I don’t find fun to manage or are interesting to use.

Even before Patch 13, “Hard Knocks” was a passive that stuck out as really bad and really uninteresting on its own. This is purely my subjective distaste of the ability, but I find the ability to be very picky about what weapons to use with it.

Not only did it get nerfed (it used to be +2% Damage per Stack (it still gave more Stacks on larger enemies before Patch 13, it just didn’t say it)), but it’s functionally unfun to use. Not only do you lose all of the stacks for one hit that may or may not be good, but Zealot gets a better version of it as a Keystone and that’s simply because they keep the buff for several seconds after they’re activated.

To carefully point out: I know this is a Keystone and is better with a different trigger, but I am simply making a comparison between stacks that stick to one attack and stacks that are built and then active for a duration.

This makes taking the Aura “Stay Close!” a very poor pick for me because I have to commit to a Passive I think is subpar compared to the other options available.

“Crunch!” is another Passive that simply ignores the problems people had with Thrust being a very suboptimal Blessing—excluding when it used to give +50% Damage per Stack as a bug.

This Passive requires you to COMPLETELY hold your Heavy Attack. This has its own problems in missions due to server-authoritative communication, meaning you can sometimes not even receive this buff because of server ping.

To activate the Passive, you need to hold your weapon’s Heavy Attack for a good ~1.5 seconds. Why do 140% Damage in that amount of time when I can do 200% Damage (2 Heavy Attacks) in the approximate span of ~1.8 seconds?

I won’t even really entertain Impact because most of the time it doesn’t seem like we need any extra Stagger to deal with anything on Damnation. Heavy Attacks from all Ogryn melee weapons can already Stagger most every enemy in a single hit.

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These are all the problems I’ve experienced with Ogryn’s new Talents thus far. I don’t want to claim that any of my complaints are objective, but the more I try to do different things with Ogryn’s Talents, the more I realize I can’t really do anything interesting.

[alsozara]

@simpliv

Reloaded and Ready” was the first Talent that really stuck out like a sore thumb to me. It’s a very picky Talent in the sense that it absolutely does not play well with the Stubber.

Hey at least kickback and Rumbler (to a lesser extent) got SOMETHING in the tree that synergizes more with them than other ranged options. That’s nice cause there’s F all else there for them that doesn’t just make you regret you’re not running stubber or ripper instead.

[simpliv]

@alsozara

That’s nice cause there’s F all else there for them that doesn’t just make you regret you’re not running stubber or ripper instead.

I don’t think I agree. Point-blank Barrage rewards you a LOT with constantly reloading your weapon, and you can take Pacemaker to double down on this, too.

If anything I feel like the right side benefits single-loaded weapons, with Ripper Guns being the middle-ground. Stubber seems to suffer the most at the moment, despite having better synergy with Lucky Bullet.

[weeping.moon]

@simpliv

To activate the Passive, you need to hold your weapon’s Heavy Attack for a good ~1.5 seconds. Why do 140% Damage in that amount of time when I can do 200% Damage (2 Heavy Attacks) in the approximate span of ~1.8 seconds?

Cause with Thrust on club you will do it anyway. Haymaker is better still.

@simpliv

I started with Veteran in Patch 13, which was honestly a mistake. You can’t really appreciate the flexibility of Veteran’s Talents until you play the other Operatives.

Unfortunately, I feel like Ogryn conceptually suffers the most

Well this one is hilarious to me, cause it’s the opposite in fact.

While there are some problems like you can’t take both Rock-nades and Softer them up. You still can mix a lot, like taunt node with club, will not work for shooters tho, but still. I have not tried yet, but i suppose Loyal Protector works fine with clubs/knives too, cause why not since ogryn can 2-3 hit anything, except papa Nurgle himself (will take 5 hits probably)

Bleed is almost mandatory to take, but atleast it’s a universal node, fine even with special melee attacks. Poke crusher 3 times with can opener on rippergun and he will die.

You even can buff rumbler with Big Boom.

Reloaded and Ready synergized with ripper and both kickback and rumbler.

Gunlugger build also works good both with rippergun and stubber.

Now it’s time to find something for plasma or shotguns on vet skill tree.

[MeatShield01]

Aesthetically, the trees are nice. But I would prefer a little more flexibility, or a lot more flexibility.

[Dumlefudge]

@simpliv

In addition to this, it does not proc when “Point-blank Barrage” reloads your weapon, which is absolutely bizarre to me that something like this was overlooked.

Have you submitted a bug report?

@simpliv

What especially confounds me is that this Passive rewards you for hitting “larger enemies” with Light Attacks, when the vast majority of what is considered a larger enemy take very little damage from Light Attacks. This doesn’t feel right whatsoever.

Unless it’s bugged, you should get stacks from the heavy attack that consumes the buff as well. Power Maul can get 20+ stacks in a horde very easily with a single special attack and shovel L1 → H2 → repeat combo is quite reliable for generating stacks as well (with BM, the H2 attack will probably stack it even better). I haven’t done much testing with the clubs lately, but Brunt’s Pride H1 → L2 → repeat should achieve a similar number of stacks.

@simpliv

Zealot gets a better version of it as a Keystone

Well, it is a keystone so it’s not surprising that it would be particularly strong, and the trigger mechanism is fundamentally different (and at times, annoying) - staggering enemies often leaves you proccing the buff with <10 stacks because you’re not moving enough to max it out and the stacks on dodge can’t help when enemies can’t fight back.

[dannylew8299]

Man, I just disagree that Ogryn is full of problems.

It’s perfectly fine that the stronger passives are locked in and crossing paths isn’t expensive, it’s not unreasonable to the point you can’t path towards the keystones of your choice and still have points to spare.

There’s only two nodes in Ogryn’s entire tree that are staples in every build, Heavyweight and Bruiser, and they’re not buried or near impossible to take at all.

[alsozara]

@simpliv

don’t think I agree. Point-blank Barrage rewards you a LOT with constantly reloading your weapon, and you can take Pacemaker to double down on this, too

I’m not gonna pretend I’ve played glugger extensively at this but here’s why I don’t agree with you here.

Firstly kickback/Rumbler basically don’t get to benefit from the fire rate increase at all besides very occasional lucky shot procs. They also don’t benefit nearly as much from the instant reload on Ult as stubber or ripper, and while incen rounds are insane for everything, having a lot more effective range I feel lets other guns get more value more consistently and in more situations (talking more about kickback specifically here, haven’t tried incen with Rumbler yet).

Pace maker is definitely a nice talent especially for Rumbler, both weapons kinda lack the ammo to try and maximise this, though with Rumbler it will proc incidentally a fair bit more than it will for kickback.

And that kinda leads into the biggest issue which is that both these guns are just far far more ammo starved than ripper to a lesser degree, and stubber to a much larger degree. They just don’t have the ammo to be used even with a full glugger spec nearly as much as other options, which means you don’t get to have nearly as much value with them for glugger’s kit.

I haven’t run gorgonum post patch but considering how effective and relatively abundant in ammo it was pre patch I can’t imagine it isn’t pretty amazing with all the support it gets in the skill tree now.

[BongoSkaggs]

About the only major structural change I’d want to orgyn’s tree is a way to get from the right or left side ult to the opposite side’s aura, but given how minor the auras are I’m not too fussed by it.

[simpliv]

@dannylew8299

It’s perfectly fine that the stronger passives are locked in and crossing paths isn’t expensive, it’s not unreasonable to the point you can’t path towards the keystones of your choice and still have points to spare.

I don’t think it’s fine, and I don’t think it really makes sense to just kneecap certain build paths for this contrived sense of locking in.

I don’t see any point why I can’t take Batter or Soften Them Up because I wanted Barrage or Rocks.

@dannylew8299

There’s only two nodes in Ogryn’s entire tree that are staples in every build, Heavyweight and Bruiser, and they’re not buried or near impossible to take at all.

Both of which are in sections I didn’t complain about. They’re the only parts of the tree that feel like you get any freedom to nurture a build, and all of the obvious staples are taken in every build regardless, as you said, because they’re in places where you can do that.

I explicitly focused on the two specific parts of the talent tree that lock out several Passives. While I appreciate the example, it ignores what I pointed out.

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@alsozara

And that kinda leads into the biggest issue which is that both these guns are just far far more ammo starved than ripper to a lesser degree, and stubber to a much larger degree.

Rumbler works best as a CC saturation weapon. It can displace and knock down many enemies very quickly, and can turn a bad situation into a manageable one in just a couple of seconds. It also has a hard-hitting impact that’s great for taking out Specialists and a plethora of Elites, with Shattering Impact giving it a real punch. More grenades can turn any situation into a very easy recovery, really.

I will agree however that Rumbler and Barrage don’t synergize all that well in the end.

Kickback I just think isn’t a good weapon by default. My perceptions of the weapon have always been hypothetical and the more I’ve field-tested it outside of perfect situations, the more I’ve come to hate the weapon. That being said, I haven’t tested it with Barrage enough to say for sure. I just don’t like the weapon.

I only say that a lot of things benefit those weapons because so far Point-blank Barrage has layers that the Stubbers currently can’t take advantage of.

@alsozara

I haven’t run gorgonum post patch but considering how effective and relatively abundant in ammo it was pre patch I can’t imagine it isn’t pretty amazing with all the support it gets in the skill tree now.

It’s like giving Ogryn Volley Fire but without the ability to be accurate. And like I said, Barrage only really just feels good when you only use it to turn situations around.

My two gripes with Stubbers is that the right side is very heavy on reloading Passives, and that you still have to brace the weapon when it’s pulled out, which isn’t sped up. It eats into precious time on the activation, but that’s minutia.

If I use it in ways you naturally want to use it, then you’ll have no ammo at all for a good quarter or third of the entire mission. If I get fed all of the ammo on the map and hope there isn’t teammates that need it as well, then it’s fine. +30% Rending really chews into Flak and Crushers, which is nice.

I’ve only done Psyk testing with the Ripper Gun before I just gave up on the build and went with the two objectively better builds right now (which is Indomitable/Loyal Protector).

As we’ve both said, Ogryn’s arsenal just doesn’t have the ammo economy to extensively use these builds, and Lucky Bullet as a Keystone currently only really benefits the Stubber as a high-density ranged weapon.

Lucky Bullet would be improved if the augment for it instead made it so critical hits trigger the effect, which can make it very usable with certain Blessings on Ripper Guns.

So I can say there’s a little bit of everything for every weapon, but nothing particularly stands out well for any of it. And since you can’t take a lot of melee-focused Passives going heavy on the right, you just feel cheated by the path restrictions.

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@Dumlefudge

Have you submitted a bug report?

No but thanks for reminding me. That was the plan after finishing this post and I completely forgot.

@Dumlefudge

Well, it is a keystone so it’s not surprising that it would be particularly strong, and the trigger mechanism is fundamentally different

You are right. It was a knee-jerk comparison because there are other similar things that don’t absorb all the Stacks on a single attack. The use cases exist where I acknowledge it as a solid build modifier but what is really griping me is the limitation in pathing that funnels directly into this Passive.

[Nish]

@alsozara

Rumbler (to a lesser extent) got SOMETHING in the tree that synergizes more with them than other ranged options.

@simpliv

Rumbler works best as a CC saturation weapon. It can displace and knock down many enemies very quickly, and can turn a bad situation into a manageable one in just a couple of seconds. It also has a hard-hitting impact that’s great for taking out Specialists and a plethora of Elites, with Shattering Impact giving it a real punch.

Had 2 games so far with Rumbler Ogryns. In both games, they had Loyal Protector.

They just spammed Rumbler the whole game dealing around 800-1.2k damage (to elites) in AoE larger than Vet Frag nade, Clearing groups of 8-10 elites in 3-4 shots including the trash while enemies couldn’t even attack back.

Wasn’t a fun experience.

[alsozara]

Not arguing rumbler isn’t strong, but I have to wonder how they could have gotten away with that without eating most of the ammo on the map. Was that the case?

[Nish]

Pretty much. Scavenger Vet that picked 2-to 3 small boxes the whole game, and a Zealot that didn’t use the ranged weapon very much + Psyker. The other game was the same but another Zealot with also low ammo use instead of psyker.

Ogryn got around as much ammo from encounters with elites as he spent, and never went into orange.

[dannylew8299]

@simpliv

I explicitly focused on the two specific parts of the talent tree that lock out several Passives. While I appreciate the example, it ignores what I pointed out.

Not ignoring you. In fact I feel compelled to say expecting players to make a choice here is okay and also not really that different from prepatch?

We’ve been making build choices forever. Not being able to take Rock, Soften them Up, Batter, and Ammo Stash in one build is fine. I don’t see how this makes Ogryn’s tree an unfortunately restrictive one with tons of anti-synergy when what’s here is actually good.

The parts that I did ignore was your thoughts on Reload and Ready (don’t know what you want from a tier 1 passive), Coward Culling (aura passive, applies to everyone and clearly for shooty teams), Hard Knocks (factually nerfed, nothing to say here), and Crunch (I can’t agree or disagree, FS has been wanting Ogryn to hold heavy attacks since launch, I don’t know why).

[simpliv]

@dannylew8299

Reload and Ready (don’t know what you want from a tier 1 passive)

It should proc with Point-blank Barrage when it auto-reloads your weapon. That’s about it.

It’s a wasted Talent for Stubber despite having a very good Talent for it immediately behind R&R. Since you don’t really reload the Stubber at all during fights (and should be preemptively keeping it loaded), it feels bad taking it for a Talent that makes you very tanky in crossfire.

It doesn’t need to be changed much at all. Just interact more with the Combat Ability.

@dannylew8299

Coward Culling (aura passive, applies to everyone and clearly for shooty teams)

My problem with a Suppression-based Aura is that Suppression gets nullified by enemies being Staggered, and they lose the Suppressed state milliseconds after they stop receiving it. Like I mentioned, Suppression itself as a mechanic seems very non-functional in the current design of the game in the case of you wanting to capitalize on it.

That being said, I couldn’t even tell you the inner workings of the mechanic. Since this is the first time anyone has gotten anything significant for Suppression, it might be worth exploring.

It just feels like you’re taking something where you have no idea if it works. Hopefully that changes soon.

@dannylew8299

I don’t see how this makes Ogryn’s tree an unfortunately restrictive one with tons of anti-synergy when what’s here is actually good.

It might ultimately just be a difference in our taste. I find the limitations contrived and uninteresting, but I can acknowledge others like the necessity in making choices.

Ultimately I feel like I should not lose out on things I love to play with because I want to make a build with a different core talent, especially when these Passives don’t have anything to do with the respective cores of the builds.

[LVSpooky]

I can’t say anything about the ranged perks, but the melee and tank perks all feel good to me.

[TheRabidOgre]

I don’t know how it compares to other characters, but I think there’s just an inherent awkwardness when you have two melee branches and one exclusively ranged branch. It means the ranged branch doesn’t have much of a choice if there’s an option it’s not fond of, because the only other choices will be melee. It also means that if it wants one of the non-ranged talents, it might be all the way on the other side of the tree, while melee builds never have to leave their neighbor.

The thing I find weird about the melee side of the tree is that there are talents in both branches that buff Heavy Attacks, but the only talent that deals with Light Attacks is the ability for Light Attacks to refresh a buff to Heavy Attacks.

I know it’s part of the draw of Ogryns to smash things, but it just feels a little limiting. Ogryns are already slow about a lot of things, and I hate feeling like I need to be even slower or I’m not benefiting from my talents, especially since it’s nearly (if not outright) impossible to avoid them if you go melee. It’s presented as an option to go Heavy, but there’s no alternative.