Would that make Killing Shot useless? The functionality stays but is tied to a Riposte.
Another Suggestion I have not made so far would go in the direction of what we have seen for Foot Knight. Getting a higher specialized effect for loss of a more stable broader effect. So you replace Wild Fervour (will be removed from game) by the “new” Talent Killing Shot:
Killing Shot: Crits will instantly slay man-sized enemies. Tagging enemies no longer applies Witch-Hunt.
This will weaken your base damage versus Elites, Specials and Monsters for the whole team, in addition you lose 5 % crit so the chance is also lower. But Killing Shot is still as strong as before.
And again, there is also the possibility of just changing Killing Shot on a general level (while keeping it as a passive) like making it only apply on single target attacks.
Yes, it only applies when you proc Riposte. Ask Velsix, he seems to do this pretty well on a regular basis. You need a higher skill-floor for sure.
Well, I think if Killing Shot is incorporated into Riposte, we could start discussing if it slays Chaos Warriors too or if we remove the condition of it being a timed-block. Like I said, you need some adjustments.
Why is that? Here’s a link to my reply to you that I made earlier: Witch Hunter Captain Rebalance:
A rough example of the balance I believe my changes would achieve:
Killing Shot
Higher aggregate sustained and mixed dps on mansized enemies than Deathknell but not by too much (without Sigmar’s Charm it might be at this level, and Fervency would be dangerous to use), less dps vs CWs/Wargors/Monsters and less horde dps than Flense.
Deathknell
Single target dps. More immediate than the other two, and more consistent than Killing Shot. Good for when you need something dead quickly and don’t have your ult yet.
Flense
Overall highest mixed dps talent but without access to insta kills and less effective against single targets. Immediate dps would also be lower than Deathknell.
You don’t have to time your block (unfortunately). Pushing resets the parry window, and in the case of the Rapier the weapon special also resets it and can be cheesily used while already blocking. I try to avoid doing these things myself but even with lag it should be pretty safe to get timed blocks, especially since Cast Away gives stam regen on push (thought that would depends on if Cast Away got changed to one of my suggested replacement ideas).
I would still consider myself a novice with it. I still haven’t figured out how to get a Riposte off into a horde without pushing (so the horde enemies don’t get staggered and you can parry another attack) at anything but medium Cata densities.
It’s a very useful talent when you’re in a bind.
This could work. It doesn’t make it anymore effective against monsters but it’s still a very large buff to Riposte. I like the idea.
I mean the thing is killing shot is what enables the whole crit-fishing playstyle which is something a lot of people are gonna value over deathknell and maybe even flense due to how much it can enable you to just butcher your way through mixed elites, especially since having slightly lessened crit chance doesn’t hurt all that much with the pseudo-random system
Out of all of his passives, I’d definitely say I’d prefer to see killing shot removed over any of the others. Rolling it into riposte sounds nice to me, and honestly crit fishing as a playstyle is just a bit questionable to me generally. Alternatively if it were just removed outright, perhaps his bonus headshot damage passive could be expanded to increase melee crit power a bit as well to halfway compensate and maintain the crit identity.
Regarding Flense I just want to add that I wouldn’t like to see a cleave limit or similar added, since that would hurt its synergy with great sword too much, and none of Saltz’ other builds have much synergy with that weapon sadly. Agreed a simple damage nerf (probably a slight one, to start) is all it really needs.
Edit: Upon further consideration I think if killing shot were removed, instead of adding it to riposte, I’d prefer to see an alternate effect added to riposte that wasn’t limited to man sized enemies. Something like riposte crits do +30% damage, or even +x% power to help crit pushes get some of their stagger back (seem to remember @Velsix not being too happy about the effect the removal of crit auto stagger had on riposte crit pushes).
Either way I feel like the main thing you’d achieve is just making it a non option on a number of weapons. Alternatively perhaps you could make it apply a weaker bleed on light attacks, and the normal bleed on heavies. This would leave it strong for GS (which I don’t think anyone would argue is a meta WHC weapon anyway), then the weaker bleed could be tuned appropriately so its not as effective as currently on light attack spamming weapons. Would still have the issue of stepping on Deathknell’s toes against elites with weapons like rapier, but at least it wouldn’t also get amazing horde killing out of it.
It’s interesting. On one hand having the stagger was useful and let Riposte hold a frontline very well. On the other, it has the potential to lower dps, as staggered enemies can’t be parried. You can of course just do a light attack instead of a push attack, but currently with Riposte and the Rapier the highest dps is to time the push attack with an enemy’s attack so that it happens almost instantly, which is much faster than l1. Having that speed let’s you get in chain Ripostes in situations where lowering block - l1 would be too slow.
I really do miss the stagger, but I can’t think of anyway it could come back without lowering Riposte’s dps. If one could choose in the moment to do a stronger push or a weaker one that would work, or if the Rapier’s push attack was somehow accessible through a different method than pushing (which would be a balancing issue in of itself).
I feel like with Deathknell and the buffed headshot passive they would be pretty close in effectiveness, but if I am wrong about this (I haven’t done any testing for it) then perhaps one of the below suggestions would be better.
Ideas
Suggestion 1 Killing Shot is removed. Riposte is made into a passive. In place of the empty talent slot, a talent that allows you and your allies to each tag three enemies instead of one is added. (or something better if anyone can think of anything).
I think this might be the most straightforward option if anyone can think of a good replacement for the talent spot.
Suggestion 2 Killing Shot and Riposte swap places. The insta killing effect of Killing Shot is added to the Riposte passive (only for Riposte crits) as well and Ripostes have 20% more headshot damage.
With this option, Killing Shot may end up being a bit of overkill and thus not chosen as a talent. However, I don’t think this would be enough for the concerns you’ve raised.
Suggestion 3 Critical hits instantly slay mansized enemies but do no bodyshot damage.
This gives Killing Shot a drawback. I’m not a fan of this one because it overrides Deathknell as the skillful option and makes Killing Shot exceptionally atrocious in high stagger teams.
Riposte
Do we want Riposte to insta kill things on lights or should they require dedicated single target attacks? I’m undecided myself.
Literal crit on demand. Regardless of whether you pick on push or a held block, it would be absolutely broken. On push would make push attacks on every saltz weapon the go-to combo for dps, both armoured and unarmoured. Held block would just mean that it would be almost impossible to become overwhelmed and cornered, as you can swing back after a block and insta-kill whatever is hitting you.
Let me give you an example. Rapier has the pistol you can use. It counts as a melee attack. Crit headshots with the Rapier’s pistol trigger Saltz’s passive and slay man-sized enemies. You can shoot with the pistol whilst blocking at the same time.
Obviously make his passive not work on the pistol. I’m also of the opinion it shouldn’t work with billhook’s alt attack.
Also with pushing i mean out of an attack, not just a push.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s a buff no doubt, but would it be stronger then flense or deathknell? In a scenario of a real game?
I think on push would be too strong. Would almost be like having Fervency 24/7. I think it working normal blocks would be against the spirit of Riposte, and I think it wouldn’t actually help the talent much outside of lag, which can already be mitigated by pushing to reset the parry window. Edit: I misunderstood your idea sorry.
Do you mean successfully staggering an enemy with a push or pushing an enemy when they attack you?
I think this would be the end affect. It would become meta very quickly if it worked on pushing.
We do not need talents to be stronger or even as strong as flense. Flense is too good at the moment. Needs to toned down so that it only procs on headshots or something like that. WHC is very headshot centric anyway. A lot of swinging with WHC at the moment, and not enough aiming for the head. For Flense, Keri puts it best, “All that flailing, but you can’t argue with the results.”
I think Deathknell is fine the way it is(good for weapons which lack cleave.). So is Riposte. It makes mince meat out of bosses that are combo heavy, like the chaos spawn and mino.
I was just looking at it how it is currently. Ofcourse flense is too good, but i was looking at riposte and how it could be made usefull or competitive with the current choices in the game.
I was not clear.
Pushing an enemy out of an attack when they focus you. Like how you can only block enemied that target you. (This would probably be too hard to implement though)
And blocking when an enemy focusses you. Still caps at 1 crit so it’s not possible to store crits by blocking alot. This would probably be too strong with the stamina regen talent, but apart from that?
Edit: While Riposte can do some great damage it’s not actually all that much (realistically with the Rapier it’s light - partial - full charge on Mino/Spawn.) It’s pretty bad on a Rat Ogre. It’s good against a Troll if you have a wall behind you as the chip damage through block is minor enough that thp on headshot/crit counters it. Stormfiend requires a wall and precise timing to get to the controller after parrying the Stormfiend.
I’ve been able to get partial - partial - full charge on the Mino and the Spawn but it’s pretty tight timing for the reward it gives (iirc roughly 380 damage out of a 4000hp pool, and it takes longer to do than most forms of boss dps as well).
Really I just want to be able to use both Deathknell and Riposte so that picking Riposte didn’t turn WHC into a one trick crit pony. Deathknell overshadows Riposte.
An aggro mechanic might work as well, perhaps on tagging? Could be op though.
Possibly, but again I think it not as in line with what Riposte is supposed to be. These would be interesting variations on other careers though.
I’d say the former since a riposte is supposed to be swift (I did fencing for a couple years so it’ll never not irk me that FS decided to call the Bsword Ox guard a “riposte” but whatever)
