I think the weapons that really shine at damnation do so bc of their horde clear. It feels like the game’ idea of tuning up the “difficulty” is to overwhelm you with numbers while mixing armored units which... isn’t that different from Vermintide 2, but then it favors certain weapons just by the way the game and weapon is designed.
Ya it hurts high damage single target mele weapons because in order to single out those priority targets that the weapon is made for you gonna have to hack your way through 5+ units one at a time and by the time you do that your better just backing off and killing it with your ranged weapon
It would be fine imho if there were alternatives for horde clear in the ranged weapon category which theoretically there is... but you will run into ammo bottlenecks which negates it again. So for example autopistol as a pseudo horde clear tool and a powerhammer for single-target. But maybe im totally wrong with that thought.
In my own attempts in the game, I found the Antax very useful. It fits my play style and does great damage at the difficulties I play in. The only complaint I have about them is that they're just not as satisfying to me as a chain weapon for this class. Being able to rev those bad boys up and saw an enemy in half is so satisfying to my 40k fandom brain.
My own tier list would have only two tiers. The top tier would be called Antax Mk V, and the bottom tier called Not Antax Mk. V. I think you can guess where each weapon fits under this system.
Cool change to the devils claw swords would be giving their parries effects that contrast the weapons normal function. For example, on the mk1 sword, instead of a quick slash, the parry could lead to a thrust that does far better armor damage than what the weapon does otherwise.
Your summary at the end and breaking down the stacked vs bell chart pattern was very interesting to me. I didn’t expect such a nice recap at the end. Nice job!
The main advantage of the Tactical Axe on the zealot isnt really the profile of the weapon itself (which I agree with your assessment) but that it's one of the only weapons aside from the Dagger which properly works with the crit-based tank build well using Faith Restored level 5 feat. High Critical Bonus stat, 5% crit Perk and high level Shred blessing and you can easily maintain 100% uptime on the toughness reduction which is by FAR the best tier 1 feat if you can keep high uptime. If lucky (or when crafting comes) you can also use Brutal Momentum with this setup, something you can't get on the dagger. The ability of this weapon to enable a non-dagger toughness reduction build is what elevates it in my view to A/B tier if setup well, at least if you arent relying on Crucian Roulette's melee crit bonus which I'm sure is a bug that will be fixed.
I agree, I use a tactical axe for crit-based gameplay and it's great. The thing hits fast and if used properly (weak spot hits) it can drop most mobs in a few hits or less. It's also just fun to play, the tactical axe and the dagger are my favorites for just going absolutely nuts, and my toughness stays up most of the time. It's an A tier weapon for my play style.
Here's some extra comments for weapons: The eviscerator. 1 - Revving it up against soft targets like infected hordes makes it work a bit like a power sword if you use heavy attacks, but it will still stun and bite into anything heavier like a maniac. 2 - The best attack sequence it has for cleaving is Push attack, heavy attack, light, light. repeat. The chainaxe. Every light attack applies its damage twice so the damage for light attacks is double that of what's shown on the attack breakdown sheet. Crits and perks activate per swing though. The Thunderhammer. A charged heavy attack to the head seems to nearly always 1 hit KO Reapers and Bulwarks (And possibly other indomitable enemies in the future). Its stats and difficulty level almost do not matter and even a gray hammer with 60% damage will deal 3750 damage to a reaper on a charged heavy headshot. You can find a hammer that can't oneshot a Reaper if you look hard enough (just find one with very low damage and first target stats) but you'd have to outright camp the store to find a hammer terrible enough to not oneshot a Reaper.
I'll have to try your approach. I'm slowly piecing together high base damage weapons to my liking - I'm closer to that with Eviscerator than Thunderhammer.
@@OffToBattle I think alternating Heavy and lights deals more damage. But weaving two lights and a push attack is much safer when dealing with hordes. Also semi related. It's not in any of the ability descriptions but when you use a zealots charge your guns gain the ability to pierce armor for a couple seconds. A shotgun will usually plink off the armor of a Crusher, but if you charge and start shooting it will count Carapace as Flak and flak as unarmored for a couple seconds. A stub revolver and shotgun can outright kill a damnation crusher in that time if you get lucky with crits.
@@Sonlirain Thanks re the revolver and shotgun. I've been trying to figure out how to use these weapons properly and be a better Zealot. I knew about the treating carapace as flak during Chastise before but being reminded is helpful because I don't have that rhythm down at this time. Next step is to try it in the field!
I am loving the hammer so far. Best single target dmg, and can also clear crowds with heavy swings. Once you get the timing down, it really comes into itself. Love running this with the flamethrower to excel at both single target dps *and* horde clears
my fav is Power Maul with Flamer. both are CC weapons perfect for me since NOONE block-push/staggers enemies. that being said, I rely on my mates to do the killing. tip: stunned/staggered enemies take more damage. a charged power maul can push TWICE when block-pushing-follow up attack. good review video.
Stunned/staggered enemies take more damage IF someone has a bonus against staggered/stunned enemies. They didn't bring over Vermintide 2's 'staggered always takes more damage' for immeasurably complex reasons I am sure.
IS, thanks for keeping up the content even with Fatshark leaving us hanging and playerbase declining. You are helping me not get burned out before they get their stuff together!
Fatshark isn't my favorite developer but they're not leaving anyone hanging. All gaming developers check out for about a month near new year. Unless you pre-ordered the game like a dope, everyone knew what they were getting into and purchased the game knowing they will have to come back to it later after substantial content has been added to really enjoy it. It's likely going to be a full year before this game bears fruit imo. If it's sooner, fantastic, but idc, there's other games to play.
@@Shoop... I bought when I heard from people I personally know that the pre-launch beta was very, very fun. It was. I like the game. I just want more. To me wanting more is the sign of a good game... and they know what they have to do.
@@CJ-wh7ik I'm not playing every day so my personal answer would be "no", and I want to find out how things changed with the (needed) balancing patch just out. Wish they'd had this worked out before launch of course!
I purposefully don’t play every day (even though sometimes I want to) because I don’t want to get burnt out before the game is complete. At least once it drops on console (if ever) I’ll be able to restart with friends
I’ve had that same camera issue as the chain axe with the psyker’s force sword, too. Seen it tons on assassination bosses on the vertical charge (not the horizontal charge).
Great video! I agree to all of it. I'll always use the Evisc even if it's just a solid A, but that's a style and 40K immersion choice. I do have very good blessings on it but not the best base stats.
I've just been leveling up zealot and I found myself just going back to eviscerator a lot of the time, getting familiar with the best mix-up between heavies, lights, shove attack or revving it for the situation. Locking down the specials and elites while you saw into them, or hitting hard with the heavy attacks when staying mobile is a nice utility in a pinch. I haven't gotten the full feats or any high-rolling weapons with good blessings yet, so I need something reliable that can still manage efficient horde clear. The bolter is still an important tool in my box for picking off elites and specials when I can't be sure if the team can.
I would like to point out the combat blade has some specific uses you wouldn't necessarily think of that are very useful. - The combat knife's heavy attack doesn't slow you down, you can rush like a madlad and run stab heretics in the face. This is both very pleasant, and can hit hard. - Your mobility is unmatched while wielding the combat blade, especially with a high mobility stat. - The lacerate blessing can go through a bulwark's shield, even if you deal no damage. It wouldn't matter a lot, unless that I realized that a bulwark take far more damage from bleed than a crusher. Making it viable to bleed a bulwark to death in a corridor, if you are unwilling to waste ammo or something.
I do have a preference for the combat blade (though I prefer shotgun or braced autogun for ranged, can’t stand the lack of reach with the flamethrower) but coming from a Vermintide background, the left clicking is actually less than I had to do there and the defense/mobility helps me tons.
Thunder Hammer all the way! I just love swinging the heavy attacks, it has a nice rhythm to it. You are right that the animation lock suck big time but to me its less annoying than having my camera stuck with the chain saw weapons, or the very low damage of the crusher. I haven't played the other axes yet, should try them.
With the swords, I honestly find one of the other marks (can't remember which one...) to be just as good against hordes as the Mk1, but it's significantly better against single armour targets. This is something I feel like you missed slightly, the ability to mix a chain of lights/heavies to access the optimal swings against hordes and single targets, as well as the possibility for block cancelling to restart a sequence. Like the special > heavy > special > heavy for the heavy sword. Admittedly, this might just have been something you didn't go into since there's quite a few weapons, but 'twas something I wanted to mention.
This is a really important thing which was touched on a little bit with the eviscerator and crusher, but missed some key tech for the heavy swords (multiple marks) and the COMBAT BLADE. Attack patterns really really change the play style for these weapons. Also: did my favorite tac axe dirty: ATROX MK7 tac axe (light attack penetration is almost 50 percent to carapace and 117 with flak). It just shreds, and becomes s tier easily with brutal momentum and headtaker. Edit: also should say I love the video and all his videos, thanks!
The combat blade is amazing. When you look at the damage output you need to times it by 2 or 3 due to how fast you strike with the weapon. Great breakdown!
my favorite OP Zealot build is the Atrox MK II. The build relies heavily on brutal momentum, and also Shred to have as Blessings. if you are able to roll this on your weapon with a close to Max or max Critical bonus modifier, you get 12% crit chance base at 80% critical bonus. Stack that with Shred for bonus critical chance on repeat strike, and then also roll crit chance as a perk, bloodletting as tier 10 feat.... You get a crit monster with a great axe that has massive cleave (heavys), crits, and survivability when played well. and IMO is the most fun zealot build I have tried so far. You get mobility on point and slides, you are carrying the team in your backpack. up to 25% crit chance with shred, 12% base potential, 10% bloodletting, and 5% on perks. up to 52% crit chance. S tier. Edit: No Crucian Roulette because that will get patched in time, and I like using my Boltgun too much with pinning fire and rending.
can i be honest im new to this game but one thing ive noticed is you only get one melee weapon to take into a mission. i wish you could choose to take two in so you can have a big damage one and then a crowd control one. i wouldnt even mind if one of those weapons takes the gun slot bc i just want a melee build
I'm running thunder hammer+ flamer and been able to carry numerous runs with it on t5/t5 hi intensity alike. Sure the stun lock is ass and it can cause some awful situations but it's a mix of all things you need. It has decent wave clear+stagger, decent damage and with good positioning you can pack in a serious punch with that charged attack. If it gets too crowded just take the flamer out. With double stacks of your ability flamer gains insane armor pierce to crushers. Hammer also allows to protect my teammates from mutants since you can 1shot them with the ability+charged heavy it saves time and ammo. The little bonus hammer has is it's ability to absolutely wipe the floor with mini bosses so with good spacing you don't even need bolter to deal damage to them.
I got a build for the Zealot that might change your mind on the Tactical Axe placement. You need a Vraks Headhunter with Crucian Roulette. Run the generic crit bleed build with the 75% toughness damage reduction and the perk that reduces your ability cooldown on crits. If you get a Tac Axe with a high crit chance, Brutal Momentum and a damage boost blessing, it can make the Antax feel like a downgrade. You empty the mag on the Vraks, switch to the Tac Axe and enjoy a critical chance that is probably as close to 100% as possible. Been my new favorite lately.
I think you underestimate the survivability that the combat blade provides. With the right blessings you can cleave through hordes and get a lot of bleed stacks, high mobility lets you just jump around entire crowds as they bleed to death.
Yeah it's good, but who wants to poke little holes with a dagger when you can cut everything in half with an axe or sword. It's effective and the mobility is satisfying but you won't catch my zealot running around with a grandma letter opener.
This video has inspired me to look at my Zealot again. I am a knife bleed addict so I am looking to change up to an axe or chainsword. See what I can do.
Posting comment on jan 24 2023 in case they fix this, the knife build has a secret bonus for killing Crusher/Mauler/armor. There's... we'll call it an Unintended Feature, with the stack damage of both bleed and flame, using your dash causes the stacks to ignore armor reduction, meaning for ~3 seconds it will do 300+ damage per tick, so you can stack up the bleed on a number of targets and do an empty dash and they will all die, this will also work with the Flamer. It's stupid, and I don't think it changes anything else about the knife but it IS slightly better currently than it's being made out to be to deal with heavy armor characters. Furthermore, the Thunder hammer's weakness continues in that its actual cleave value is quite low for its swing speed and in higher difficulties (Heresy+Damnation) the sheer number of attackers can cause serious issues where the weapon will Dead Stop on light enemies with alarming regularity. against true hordes the T-hammer is Very weak as a primary choice. And I say this as a T-hammer main, I love this thing, but its weaknesses are something I have become intimately familiar with. (As an aside, I think that the Devil's Claw weapons need some kind of buff, the buff I'd LIKE to see is increasing the stagger value of the parry attack IMMENSELY. maybe 25 stagger? so it blows things off their feet on stagger, making it more useful as a Duelist weapon against stronger targets, this specific buff would make it more viable in higher levels because it gives an answer to the 4 rager problem that you otherwise run Deep into, also helps against 4 maulers, or even a single Crusher/Bulwark, my 2 cents)
The way to get the most out of many weapons in the game is by mixing light and heavy attacks. Some weapons that seem weak can string horde clearing attacks by mixing lights and heavies. Also on combat axes the fact that you can stun lock berserkers with the special attack makes them much better than people initially think. One thing fat shark does well is weapon design, just some weapons have a higher skill cap. You can't just mash all light attacks or all heavy attacks, that might work on lower difficulties but to use them on higher you need to push, dodge and mix attacks.
4:19 .... For zealot, tactical axe is definitely tier 1 especially if your going for crit build. For one, they have similar crit chance as the catacan knife while additionally having the critical bonus on their modifier, which means the zealot will near permanently get 75 percent damage reduction during on melee. And having high mobility and attack speed does help with your survival if you're just skilled enough too. I know they are weak vs crowd but you can solve that easily if you just get one with the brutal momentum blessing, which is same for all the axes. You haven't played zealot until you go full berserk with this thing on your hand. It's unmatched with any other weapon I tried 10:15 With Antex axe, you don't really need brutal momentum, unlike other axes. What was missing in the intruduction on these babes is, their push attack IS the brutal momentum. If there's a crowd, just repeat push attack. It's much faster than just normal attack too btw. Brutal momentum just spice it up real nice. 12:30 Tip on using the eviscerator, if there are armored elites in the mob, try vertical alt heavy attack.(or was it push attack?) It will just cleave through the pox walkers and alt will only trigger upon hitting the elites.
#1 S-tier is chain axe, because it sounds cool when I hit things. The rest of the list doesn't matter. On a serious note: Achylis combat axe: the lights are better for flak, unarmored, maniac, and infected. Only use the heavies for unyielding and carapace. It also gets brutal momentum, but it's harder to use that cleave because of the vertical swipes. Solid weapon. MK II Tac Axe, use the same build as the knife and it performs very similar with better AP. Should be higher up. Chain axe heavies have poor cleave and are slow, only use the light unless you have it revved and need to kill one target. Lights actually hit twice, so the number shown is deceptive. Check the rev stat for truer numbers. The shove attack is your only reliable CC on it, follow up with two swings, repeat in hordes. I suggest pairing with a gun that can thin out hordes: shotty, braced, infantry auto, flamer. Chain sword - lights have GREAT movest, fast swing speed, high crit, narrow strikes, does just as much damage as heavies, so spam these against few targets. Heavies are awesome for CC, fast, repeatable startup, great cleave. Shove attack sucks, literal stab. Good damage, just bad follow-up to a shove that only hits one target and easily misses. Activate for specials and elites. Only weakness is short range, easily noticeable between it and eviscerator.
For the other 2 heavy sword variants: Instead of special-heavy, do special-push stab-heavy. The push can stagger trash mobs around the elite you're focusing on, making your following attacks safer, and the stab has a much higher crit rate than other attacks, then the last heavy is an overhead. Mark 7 especially has its light 2/3/4 as relentless instead of vanguard like Mark 9 does, which has a very high stagger value and can even continue the stagger from the special against Dreg Ragers. Also a horizontal heavy can crit on multiple elites while used during Chastise the Wicked (the dash), deleting multiple gunners when they're stacked, making Mark 7 much more versatile than Mark 9.
I've got a regular Assault Chainsword with the 5% Shred (5 stacks = 25%crit) and Devastating Strike (ignore hit mass on crit) blessings. Combined with a stub revolver with 4% Crucian Roulette and the extra 30% crit against bleeding Feat, I'm getting ~97% crit chance. The devastating strike is working overtime on this build and just mulches hordes even when there's a bunch of flak thrown into the mix. Against carapace, the high crit gets around most of the damage reduction so mindlessly spamming light attacks is somewhat viable. Only enemy that causes an issue are Bulwarks, which require side stepping their swing and revving up the chainsword to get around the shield. Biggest issue is the chainsword is currently bugged so occasionally hitting with a revved attack only hits for the first tick of 18 damage and cancels before doing more damage
Get thrust on the thunder hammer and it really comes into its own. Just absurd single target charged heavies and consistent very high horde clear with non charged heavies. And you actually missed its biggest weakness - complete lack of cleave on charged heavy. If you swing it into a horde charged you turn precisely one nurglite into paste... and then... it bounces off them like you hit a wall. #feelsbadman. But my buddy who zealot mains only runs it and its a HUGE addition to the team for big boi clear on damnation highs. I rolled mine properly (one of the power blessings tier 4 and tier 3 thrust) and its game changing. 2 shots daemon hosts with ult and proper feats ON DAMNATION. EASY C tier - I'd prob put it at B for its single target clear.
Mk IV chain axe is best weapon hands down now. Its light attacks will stun ragers, maulers, even crushers allowing you to just unload on them. It has good horde clear, rips up boss shields, does good damage to monstrosities, and it's simple as hell to use. Single target? Tap. Aoe? Hold. Combined with zealot attack speed it's simply glorious.
My experience with the catachan vs the heavy sword is that the catachan is safer due to higher stagger, and the heavy attacks have a flatter pattern which makes aiming for the head easier, but that the devil sword does less damage. Personally, Kruber and Sienna's 1h sword in vermintide was my favorite move set and this holds true in darktide with the mk1 devil sword and power sword.
For me, I'm less worried about the damage. It's all about the attack pattern. I love the Mk XI heavy sword for the vanguard light attack spam. Same with the Ogryn's Mk III cleaver. If I need to focus down a Crusher or Mutant, then I can mag dump with a bolter. As you mentioned. I've yet to dive into the blessing options for the Zealot (or any human character) as I main Ogryn. When I'm happy with my Ogryn's weapon options, then I'll probably take a closer look at the Zealot.
After sinking a lot of time into this game and playing around with all the melee weapons I find that they all are great and viable as long as you make up for specific weapon weakness with the right gun and or blessings/perks, here are some weapons that that I find are fun to use. 1 mk 1 catachan for is ease of use and defense parry. 2 mk 4 catachan the overhead strike on this sword does the highest damage out of all traditional sword like weapons and makes short work of all enemies except carapace, also has decent horde clear. 3 chain axe it's like a tac axe but with more damage slightly less swing speed but not by much and great defense also best shredder in the game rips all heretics to pieces, the camera problem is not really an issue as you can simply hold block if it swings your cam down or just cancel chainsaw midway if you need to. 4 mk 2 tac axe super mobile extremely fast attacks good charged heavy's you can dance around enemies and hordes with this fun weapon. 5 Thunder hammer because top tier bonks of course, absolutely destroys monstrosities and every other tough enemy, can swap cancel after charged strike to negate the the animation lock.
I'd love a Zealot ranged weapons list. I find myself grabbing either the Bolter, Revolver or Flamer depending on the situation and haven't branched out beyond the occasional shotgun usage.
Flamer is best hands down if you have no horde clearer on your team. Revolver is best if you don't need the flamer and you're mostly a melee zealot and just need something to take out the occasional pesky enemies. The fast swap makes killing the most problematic enemies (snipers, bombers, trappers, gunners, shot gunners) easy. Bolter is best if no one on your team is good against armor. Otherwise, its slow swap speed is a detriment unless you're mainly playing ranged (play a veteran then!) Kantrel XII is best if no one on your team is good at taking out ranged enemies. If this is the case though you should be playing Veteran. All the guns can work though, but I would say Flamer or Revolver are usually the best picks.
My problem with rating things is that I stay stuck on Malice because my quickplay teams don't stay alive well with my Zealot. (My best friend just upgraded his computer so that he can play Darktide - he was still on Win 7 haha. Hopefully a long-term buddy in the game.) On Malice, I'm saving teams from crazy/ insane situations as Ogryn that should and do kill off my Zealot. If I take flamer, I'm completely giving up anti-sniper. It's a conundrum for opinions because the threat mix is different.
I just started leveling my Zealot class, and my character is a weirdo, I like to leave him in mostly prison garn or colorful pants and using mostly combat knife. Not always most efficient, but so fun to be like a quick unhinged ninja.
Watched this purely to see where Thunder Hammer ends up. My rebuttal: Skill Issue Flamer + Thunderhammer. Crushers surrounded by trash? Torch the crowd, it staggers the Crusher. A good rolled thunderhammer will already ruin a crusher, perfect TH can outright oneshot them with Chastise. The recovery on charged attacks is kind of necessary or else it would be god tier.
You can still get most of the crowd control out of the Catachan mark 4 by using the Light-Heavy combo, trading the double sweeping heavy for only 1 every other attack, but it does considerably more heavy attack damage than the other two for some arbitrary reason and it does have a strikedown for dealing with lone enemies. The mark 7 is the odd one out with both low damage and singular heavy on the horizontal combo, plus its animation sequence for using its own strikedown combo is awkward and easy to mess up in real gameplay.
I like the mkVII because its heavy chain starts with a sweep so it's easier to go directly into it, which has more utility than starting with a vertical attack. I have noted the relatively poor ability of the heavy vertical to actually kill things.
Also, I do like that a lot of the weapons can be effective at a lot of the difficulties. Let’s me have more choices than being pigeon holed into 1 or 2 “meta”. It’s more the case at lower difficulties, but I just got done watching a guy in damnation using a catachan bleed build.
The load i always end up with is Hammer/Bolter. The quick heavy swings of the hammer just let me wade through hordes with 0 cares in the world. In a pinch, if there's a big boy, the thunder/ full charged heavy usually takes them out when you add in dmg from team. But ideally, i like to pull out the rupture bolter, quick burst, and crushers are gone in literal moments. I had a ton of fun e the Evi, but i still think i can control the field better w the hammer.
Using heavy sword vii with power and dmg trait, more toughness on kill and impact talent with bolter. With the huge amount of stagger on light combo an 7+ cleave targets its easily able to tank and delete hordes alone on damnation, something the IX was a lot weaker at.
Also want to add that the MK 9 heavy sword can be really strong and fun to use, that flurry of cleave damage with its versatility makes it feel A tier to me.
Please try Mk I Devils Claw with devastating strike (crits ignore enemy mass), a Crucian Roulette gun and the talent that crits reduce cooldown of alt. In a horde you can reset your alt in 1 or 2 swings. It’s fun and definitely works in T4
After grinding lots of hours with the Antax, I became a worse player in general you can heal up to full with your passive talent with 320 max health, wasn't even using my F once
Hammer works really well in its limited niche of good solid horde control in my opinion, but your points to the negatives all stand, too. A bolter or agripinaa braced autogun helps a lot but you're still seriously limited by that annoying lack of armor piercing capability. In that regard I do not quite see why you placed the hammer so low yet the annoyingly spammed charged crusher maul so high when they do a lot of the same with the hammer having better spikes while underperforming everywhere else. Hammer is still much more usable imo than both non-eviscerator chain weapons.
While my favorite weapon is actually one of the tactical axes with brutal momentum, I agree with all the reasoning and points made in this video primarily because I feel like most other weapons are entirely dependent on getting good blessings.
imo combat knife excels at disrupting a wave, dividing a horde between the zealot taking aggro, dancing around the enemies, forcing the ranged enemies to become melee like a pseudo-ogryn, while the rest of the team cleans up after the bleed stacks
For cmbat knife and some other weapons (single shot lasers) use auto-fire. I have it set on 4th mouse button. I also use 5th mouse button for aim toggle.
My experience with Zealot was when I swapped to Thunder Hammer mid way thru leveling my Zealot, I found myself getting my butt kicked melee'ing groups. I switched to Crusher and it was better, but I was still getting hurt more than I liked. I swapped to Combat Blade and melee combat became far less scary, in fact I started to really enjoy melee combat. Then I got an Antax and it was definitely more like the combat blade than the Crusher/TH but it also did a ton of damage. The Thunder Hammer and Crusher were just far too slow plus it screws with your mobility and that was really screwing with my play style.
I had the same experience with a thunder hammer while leveling. I suspect it gets a buff next pass but even so, I'm curious what I can do with one with decent blessings.
Thunderhammer is like the Plasmagun on the Veteran. It takes practice, and scales significantly with a few key offensive blessings and taking the can't be stunned by melee attacks skill (instead of the heal when in your invuln state) which wills ave you significantly more often then the heal on death skill because you can chain all your heavy attacks without being interrupted thus doing significantly more damage faster.
@@auretioustaak6579 OK, that gives me something to work with. While leveling I took the "can't be stunned" too. I've never been able to make the heal work well yet and the thunder hammer feels like it needs to avoid interrupts as much as possible. What blessings do you like? ...I'm doing well with an Eviscerator/ Boltgun combo at the moment but I want to make that thunder hammer work!
@@OffToBattle there's another youtuber called "Claysthetics" who did a discussion video of the open letter/patch notes. Someone in the comments asked me the same thing as I main thunderhammer and boltgun. I did a long multi-post (it's like 5 comments long because of character limits) response in detail over there. There's 12 or so comments attached to it. Jump over there and read through my response there.
@@auretioustaak6579 I've spoken to Clay myself. Thanks, I'll look into more detail there. I was trying the hammer today actually. I like it, it's just tougher in practice because quickplay teammates are inherently random. Anyway, will follow up. Take care! Edit: Found it!
Strong disagree about Heavy Sword. With the right blessings, assuming you have a decent heavy armour elite killer in your squad, its a god tier horde clear / survival weapon with great cleave and damage. It thrives when you are literally drowning in more lightly armoured enemies. You can “swim” in the horde and nothing can touch you. My second favorite melee weapon for the Preacher class, just behind Crusher.
Chainsword for me. Very good in Heresy, bit underpowered in Damnation. Only heavy attacks, swipes left and right, good crowd control. Alt mode for single target very effective IMO, good block-push against doggies and poxbursters. Damnation, needs more power (10%), for more stagger on mobs, but still viable. Maybe I should try the Eviscerator again, didn't like the awkward swipe angles on heavy attacks. I like those weapons, they require some thought and movement, and not just spamming attacks.
Heavy swords Model XI has all Vanguard light attacks and is the only sword in the family to have 3 heavy attacks in a combo, and two of them are Vanguard. Everything is simple for me, light attacks for trash and hordes, heavy attacks for elites and specialists. My favorite is the Turtolsky Mk VI Heavy Sword, it has the tastiest light attack patterns and effective heavy attacks. Devastating Strike on Turtolsky Mk VI Heavy Sword + Crucian Roulette on Zarona Mk IIa Quickdraw Stub Revolver = GodRoll UP: Crucian Roulette nerfed after patch, but Turtolsky Mk VI Heavy Sword still wroth it
Interesting to see that none of these weapons come close to the Bull Butcher with a Slaugtherer blessing on it. I would have assumed a Heavy Sword would.
Yeah, the Mk II Cleaver is easily S tier. I've got some decent rolls on mine. I'm just waiting for them to let us reroll blessings before i upgrade it.
I prefer the Eviscerator because of 3 things. Horde clear, single target damage, and VVVVRRRRRR! I like the Idea of the Thunder Hammer, but its not as useful as I had imagined it would be. Haven't tried the axe, or the mace aince launch thou. Maybe they're better than I remember.
Nice tier list and also nice explanations. I have to disagree with some things you say though. And yes I only play Damnation and have lots and lots of hours into the game. 2 things basically: You don't talk enough about crits and the inherent %-increase in some weapons. Tac Axes for example should be way higher. A good Mark 2 or even 4 with Brutal Momentum is an easy A. The second thing you almost totally neglect is movability. It is obvious that you prefer the slower weapons (Antax, Evi, Crusher) and that is fine when you like that playstyle. For me personally i hate to play slow and the movement speed from the combat blade makes it an S for me. While you have to be a sitting duck in your backline when too many shooters are in front... waiting for your F to recharge, I am already in that enemy backline with my combat blade, killing all the gunners and reapers and giving my team room to breathe. This makes it even a really good support weapon for the team, since you can rush in without needing to F.
Our Zealot is playing combat blade+bolter and reduce F with crit. You can basically spam F every 5-8seconds and just be at the back line and killing everything. If you use speed up from heavy and slide. You are just running all over the place. Also with Mercy killer your dmg output goes really high
The only melee weapons I use for my zealot are the eviscerator, thunder hammer, and now power maul. I use the eviscerator as my main heresy + weapon; but the power maul is growing on me. The thunder hammer is my favourite weapon of the bunch; but that animation lock makes it an unwise choice for heresy +.
Pair the thunderhammer with the can't be stunned in melee, and get slaughterer and either headtaker or thrust on it and you'll immediately feel a power spike. The animation lock is the thing everyone bitches about but it's a a balancer to someone who can chain off of a group of enemies (thanks to blessing's triggering the best off of them) and 4 to 5 tap a plague ogryn or demonhost solo on Damnation. It is far more reliable in Damnation then many of the other weapons, because whilst it won't clear hordes stupidly fast, you can in effect stunlock whole hordes with good cc and impact and just hold chokes solo, assuming nothing is shooting at you then you get to be aggressive and work through top them or pull back etc. Don't forget it has a decent reach which thanks to attacking through walls and doors being a thing, is surprisingly good overall. A good thunderhammer on someone that has practiced with it and understands the nuances of it, can solo, without tanks/other people demonhosts on heresy or below and kill them faster then the time it takes for the rest of the squad to shit bricks and creep around them. That alone is reason enough to learn how to use the thunderhammer properly.
I got lucky with my MK VII heavy sword. 380 base, max cleave and max damage. Never use heavy attack with it, the light attack destroys hordes like they are nothing. Defo my favourite weapon now.
I do have to disagree with the hate/low grade for the tactical axe. With the critical bonus and finesse bonuses you can get insane critical hit change with shred and the right Feats. I can melt through elites on Damnation pretty insanely fast. Hord clear is the obvious lacking element, but honestly the mobility makes it a non-issue. You can push, dodge as you attack and have no issues soloing large hords. I also really appreciate the fast attack speed. Maybe it's not "meta" but it's my favorite so far and I feel its better that D/C.
Thunderhammer with my build on damnation 1 hits all Ogryns including Crushers, 4 hits Daemons, 3 hits the Ogryn boss and 3 to 5 hits on beast of nurgle to kill them..... It is also great for horde clearing if used correctly.... So I very much disagree that its C tier.
I got brutal momentum on an Achlys and I must say that it is a great weapon. I get so much utility out of it. It definitely surprised me. I'm still looking for an antax. By the way turn your sway down in options for camera that will help with some weapons like chainaxe.
why did you discuss brutal momentum in relation to the combat axes but not the tactical axes? You talked about the cleave with the tactical axes, but their entire focus is on crit builds designed to hit weak spots which can activate brutal momentum, allowing them to cleave very effectively. They definitely aren't in the same tier as combat axes, but it feels like this wasn't really considered.
for me, the crusher is the best because flat out it will put a ranged unit thats like 8 to 10m out permanently on its ass or make it perma staggered meaning it cant shoot me and has to wait its turn to die to me or my allies
Sparty, as @deleted axion (don't know how to tag people) said, weapon is not bad it you can't mindlessly slash with light or heavy attack or just use special attack because you also have bash attack and with some weapons you have to combine light qnd heavy and sometimes you have to do different combos like L L H, some have L H H, some L H L H and so on AND besides that, some weapons, for example "bad" heavy swords or catachan ones require using things like bash attack and first heavy for armor and light then second heavy for horde, or maybe special attack then charged for single target burst and light, bash and 2nd or third charged for hordes. I was just making hypothetical example but my point is, skill ceeling for some weapons is higher, it doesn't mean they are worse. Think outside the box. Some are just better or worse, like thunder hammer being worse then crusher period and ogryn cleavers being great example by i think mk3 having biggest damage stat-wise, best AoE AND the quickest (you can use light heavy combo or just smash light for hordes) yet it still had great single target strike in first charged then you can special for stun and repeat while the other one, 6 i think is just stabby and had horrible AoE horde clear while having lower damage aswell for some reaaon...
it’s interesting looking at different tier lists from diff creators. some say the crusher is terrible, others say its amazing. but everyone agrees the antax is broken lol
Hey, really interesting video! Some things I agree with, some I don't, but I find your feedback really intersting! I'd love to see your take on the ranged weapons and why the shotgun is number one! XD
i would have swapped antax and eviscerator but otherwise yeah i kinda agree, i feel like on damnation the hoard clear is slightly more, and is therefore more valuble but thats just me
15:00 warning, you rolled a god blessing with that one, its not supposed to be that strong, i have slaughter on my bull butcher knife and it just outshine every other bull butchers i have
Question, what do you like for a ranged weapon to offset it? I don't remember if I have that trait on a bull butcher but I have it on "a" cleaver for sure.
@@OffToBattle i've tried everything but i can only find myself with bull butcher and blastoom grenade gauntlet launcher for the ogryn (+25% unyelding damage) i really need the gauntlet to do well against ragers, maulers, crushers and bullworks, you can get it to do 550 dmg to crushers with the falcon punch without the 50% ogryn dmg trait (750 with the trait 3 shotting them in damnation), falcon punch against elites (special attack) and the normal attack against shooters, reapers and also bullworks (the game calls it secondary action attack when you aim) but you always want to refine your ranged for unyelding because bosses are a nightmare in damnation i tried other knives but i really prefer the bull butcher even without the slaughter blessing, slaugther blessing just bring it to power sword level of shit clear capabilities instead of going with the 50% dmg reducion and more damage to ogryns i prefer the box of grenades upgrade, just to do more damage to bosses with that (beast of nurgle is your worst opponent), but is also kinda nice if you hit flak or carapace armor in the middle of a big horde in melee i just use the gauntlet rarely to save ammo when i finish off crushers, the gauntlet heavy attack do a little more damage then any cleaver heavys to carapace, but does a lot more stagger than the cleavers, you make them sit down by just smaking them with the launcher
You're sleeping on tac axes. Tac axes especially the 7 makes damnations extremely easy, you can stagger any special/Elite, have great maneuverability, synergizes with crit which makes you insanely tanky, and attacks very fast stacking blessings extremely fast. Top blessings for Aatrox IMO are Shredder, Brutal Momentum, and the two blessings IDR the names that give % power on hit, and % power on chained attack.
Im surprised with Catachan Mk IV being lowest possible tear, it has very high heavy attack dmg. Combo Light -> Heavy -> Light -> Heavy have one of fastest horde clear i saw in game, with high mobility. Dmg against armor is low thats true but certainly doesnt deserve F tier imho.
Even without the self stun it has one big issue for me. The charged attack does no cleave and specials/elites you want to smash with it are often among a mob of chaff.
![Pike All Bosses No Hit [DSR]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/1v2rI78Plpg/mqdefault.jpg)
I think the weapons that really shine at damnation do so bc of their horde clear. It feels like the game’ idea of tuning up the “difficulty” is to overwhelm you with numbers while mixing armored units which... isn’t that different from Vermintide 2, but then it favors certain weapons just by the way the game and weapon is designed.
Ya it hurts high damage single target mele weapons because in order to single out those priority targets that the weapon is made for you gonna have to hack your way through 5+ units one at a time and by the time you do that your better just backing off and killing it with your ranged weapon
It would be fine imho if there were alternatives for horde clear in the ranged weapon category which theoretically there is... but you will run into ammo bottlenecks which negates it again. So for example autopistol as a pseudo horde clear tool and a powerhammer for single-target. But maybe im totally wrong with that thought.
In my own attempts in the game, I found the Antax very useful. It fits my play style and does great damage at the difficulties I play in. The only complaint I have about them is that they're just not as satisfying to me as a chain weapon for this class. Being able to rev those bad boys up and saw an enemy in half is so satisfying to my 40k fandom brain.
My own tier list would have only two tiers. The top tier would be called Antax Mk V, and the bottom tier called Not Antax Mk. V. I think you can guess where each weapon fits under this system.
same. plus I love the thunder hammer because it goes bonk
Cool change to the devils claw swords would be giving their parries effects that contrast the weapons normal function. For example, on the mk1 sword, instead of a quick slash, the parry could lead to a thrust that does far better armor damage than what the weapon does otherwise.
Your summary at the end and breaking down the stacked vs bell chart pattern was very interesting to me. I didn’t expect such a nice recap at the end. Nice job!
The main advantage of the Tactical Axe on the zealot isnt really the profile of the weapon itself (which I agree with your assessment) but that it's one of the only weapons aside from the Dagger which properly works with the crit-based tank build well using Faith Restored level 5 feat. High Critical Bonus stat, 5% crit Perk and high level Shred blessing and you can easily maintain 100% uptime on the toughness reduction which is by FAR the best tier 1 feat if you can keep high uptime. If lucky (or when crafting comes) you can also use Brutal Momentum with this setup, something you can't get on the dagger. The ability of this weapon to enable a non-dagger toughness reduction build is what elevates it in my view to A/B tier if setup well, at least if you arent relying on Crucian Roulette's melee crit bonus which I'm sure is a bug that will be fixed.
I agree, I use a tactical axe for crit-based gameplay and it's great. The thing hits fast and if used properly (weak spot hits) it can drop most mobs in a few hits or less. It's also just fun to play, the tactical axe and the dagger are my favorites for just going absolutely nuts, and my toughness stays up most of the time. It's an A tier weapon for my play style.
I agree. I have an atrox MK II with brutal momentum and tier 3 shred. Its my favorite for crits and carrying the team.
Here's some extra comments for weapons:
The eviscerator.
1 - Revving it up against soft targets like infected hordes makes it work a bit like a power sword if you use heavy attacks, but it will still stun and bite into anything heavier like a maniac.
2 - The best attack sequence it has for cleaving is Push attack, heavy attack, light, light. repeat.
The chainaxe.
Every light attack applies its damage twice so the damage for light attacks is double that of what's shown on the attack breakdown sheet.
Crits and perks activate per swing though.
The Thunderhammer.
A charged heavy attack to the head seems to nearly always 1 hit KO Reapers and Bulwarks (And possibly other indomitable enemies in the future). Its stats and difficulty level almost do not matter and even a gray hammer with 60% damage will deal 3750 damage to a reaper on a charged heavy headshot.
You can find a hammer that can't oneshot a Reaper if you look hard enough (just find one with very low damage and first target stats) but you'd have to outright camp the store to find a hammer terrible enough to not oneshot a Reaper.
I'll have to try your approach. I'm slowly piecing together high base damage weapons to my liking - I'm closer to that with Eviscerator than Thunderhammer.
@@OffToBattle I think alternating Heavy and lights deals more damage. But weaving two lights and a push attack is much safer when dealing with hordes.
Also semi related. It's not in any of the ability descriptions but when you use a zealots charge your guns gain the ability to pierce armor for a couple seconds.
A shotgun will usually plink off the armor of a Crusher, but if you charge and start shooting it will count Carapace as Flak and flak as unarmored for a couple seconds.
A stub revolver and shotgun can outright kill a damnation crusher in that time if you get lucky with crits.
@@Sonlirain Thanks re the revolver and shotgun. I've been trying to figure out how to use these weapons properly and be a better Zealot. I knew about the treating carapace as flak during Chastise before but being reminded is helpful because I don't have that rhythm down at this time. Next step is to try it in the field!
I love this kind of content, makes me want to play darktide again and try out things.
I am loving the hammer so far. Best single target dmg, and can also clear crowds with heavy swings. Once you get the timing down, it really comes into itself. Love running this with the flamethrower to excel at both single target dps *and* horde clears
my fav is Power Maul with Flamer. both are CC weapons perfect for me since NOONE block-push/staggers enemies. that being said, I rely on my mates to do the killing.
tip: stunned/staggered enemies take more damage. a charged power maul can push TWICE when block-pushing-follow up attack.
good review video.
Stunned/staggered enemies take more damage IF someone has a bonus against staggered/stunned enemies. They didn't bring over Vermintide 2's 'staggered always takes more damage' for immeasurably complex reasons I am sure.
IS, thanks for keeping up the content even with Fatshark leaving us hanging and playerbase declining. You are helping me not get burned out before they get their stuff together!
Fatshark isn't my favorite developer but they're not leaving anyone hanging. All gaming developers check out for about a month near new year. Unless you pre-ordered the game like a dope, everyone knew what they were getting into and purchased the game knowing they will have to come back to it later after substantial content has been added to really enjoy it. It's likely going to be a full year before this game bears fruit imo. If it's sooner, fantastic, but idc, there's other games to play.
@@Shoop... I bought when I heard from people I personally know that the pre-launch beta was very, very fun. It was. I like the game. I just want more. To me wanting more is the sign of a good game... and they know what they have to do.
Wow bro. You haven't got burned out after all this time? Pretty crazy
@@CJ-wh7ik I'm not playing every day so my personal answer would be "no", and I want to find out how things changed with the (needed) balancing patch just out. Wish they'd had this worked out before launch of course!
I purposefully don’t play every day (even though sometimes I want to) because I don’t want to get burnt out before the game is complete. At least once it drops on console (if ever) I’ll be able to restart with friends
This is still best Darktide Video 4 months later. :)
I’ve had that same camera issue as the chain axe with the psyker’s force sword, too. Seen it tons on assassination bosses on the vertical charge (not the horizontal charge).
Seems to be a bug with mutant, striking his head jerks the camera down. Occasionally happens with other elites.
Go to settings and change camera sway to 0%. Otherwise you can dodge sideways tduring the strike to keep vertical height.
Great video! I agree to all of it.
I'll always use the Evisc even if it's just a solid A, but that's a style and 40K immersion choice. I do have very good blessings on it but not the best base stats.
I've just been leveling up zealot and I found myself just going back to eviscerator a lot of the time, getting familiar with the best mix-up between heavies, lights, shove attack or revving it for the situation. Locking down the specials and elites while you saw into them, or hitting hard with the heavy attacks when staying mobile is a nice utility in a pinch.
I haven't gotten the full feats or any high-rolling weapons with good blessings yet, so I need something reliable that can still manage efficient horde clear. The bolter is still an important tool in my box for picking off elites and specials when I can't be sure if the team can.
I would like to point out the combat blade has some specific uses you wouldn't necessarily think of that are very useful.
- The combat knife's heavy attack doesn't slow you down, you can rush like a madlad and run stab heretics in the face. This is both very pleasant, and can hit hard.
- Your mobility is unmatched while wielding the combat blade, especially with a high mobility stat.
- The lacerate blessing can go through a bulwark's shield, even if you deal no damage. It wouldn't matter a lot, unless that I realized that a bulwark take far more damage from bleed than a crusher. Making it viable to bleed a bulwark to death in a corridor, if you are unwilling to waste ammo or something.
I do have a preference for the combat blade (though I prefer shotgun or braced autogun for ranged, can’t stand the lack of reach with the flamethrower) but coming from a Vermintide background, the left clicking is actually less than I had to do there and the defense/mobility helps me tons.
Thunder Hammer all the way! I just love swinging the heavy attacks, it has a nice rhythm to it. You are right that the animation lock suck big time but to me its less annoying than having my camera stuck with the chain saw weapons, or the very low damage of the crusher. I haven't played the other axes yet, should try them.
i love love love the crusher, i have clutched so many revives. someone goes down and you just spam 2-3 charged lights and get the revive
With the swords, I honestly find one of the other marks (can't remember which one...) to be just as good against hordes as the Mk1, but it's significantly better against single armour targets.
This is something I feel like you missed slightly, the ability to mix a chain of lights/heavies to access the optimal swings against hordes and single targets, as well as the possibility for block cancelling to restart a sequence. Like the special > heavy > special > heavy for the heavy sword.
Admittedly, this might just have been something you didn't go into since there's quite a few weapons, but 'twas something I wanted to mention.
This is a really important thing which was touched on a little bit with the eviscerator and crusher, but missed some key tech for the heavy swords (multiple marks) and the COMBAT BLADE. Attack patterns really really change the play style for these weapons. Also: did my favorite tac axe dirty: ATROX MK7 tac axe (light attack penetration is almost 50 percent to carapace and 117 with flak). It just shreds, and becomes s tier easily with brutal momentum and headtaker.
Edit: also should say I love the video and all his videos, thanks!
The combat blade is amazing. When you look at the damage output you need to times it by 2 or 3 due to how fast you strike with the weapon. Great breakdown!
my favorite OP Zealot build is the Atrox MK II. The build relies heavily on brutal momentum, and also Shred to have as Blessings. if you are able to roll this on your weapon with a close to Max or max Critical bonus modifier, you get 12% crit chance base at 80% critical bonus. Stack that with Shred for bonus critical chance on repeat strike, and then also roll crit chance as a perk, bloodletting as tier 10 feat.... You get a crit monster with a great axe that has massive cleave (heavys), crits, and survivability when played well. and IMO is the most fun zealot build I have tried so far. You get mobility on point and slides, you are carrying the team in your backpack. up to 25% crit chance with shred, 12% base potential, 10% bloodletting, and 5% on perks. up to 52% crit chance. S tier. Edit: No Crucian Roulette because that will get patched in time, and I like using my Boltgun too much with pinning fire and rending.
can i be honest im new to this game but one thing ive noticed is you only get one melee weapon to take into a mission. i wish you could choose to take two in so you can have a big damage one and then a crowd control one. i wouldnt even mind if one of those weapons takes the gun slot bc i just want a melee build
I'm running thunder hammer+ flamer and been able to carry numerous runs with it on t5/t5 hi intensity alike. Sure the stun lock is ass and it can cause some awful situations but it's a mix of all things you need. It has decent wave clear+stagger, decent damage and with good positioning you can pack in a serious punch with that charged attack. If it gets too crowded just take the flamer out. With double stacks of your ability flamer gains insane armor pierce to crushers. Hammer also allows to protect my teammates from mutants since you can 1shot them with the ability+charged heavy it saves time and ammo. The little bonus hammer has is it's ability to absolutely wipe the floor with mini bosses so with good spacing you don't even need bolter to deal damage to them.
I love the honesty of this youtuber
I got a build for the Zealot that might change your mind on the Tactical Axe placement. You need a Vraks Headhunter with Crucian Roulette. Run the generic crit bleed build with the 75% toughness damage reduction and the perk that reduces your ability cooldown on crits. If you get a Tac Axe with a high crit chance, Brutal Momentum and a damage boost blessing, it can make the Antax feel like a downgrade. You empty the mag on the Vraks, switch to the Tac Axe and enjoy a critical chance that is probably as close to 100% as possible. Been my new favorite lately.
I think you underestimate the survivability that the combat blade provides. With the right blessings you can cleave through hordes and get a lot of bleed stacks, high mobility lets you just jump around entire crowds as they bleed to death.
Yeah it's good, but who wants to poke little holes with a dagger when you can cut everything in half with an axe or sword. It's effective and the mobility is satisfying but you won't catch my zealot running around with a grandma letter opener.
Or you overestimate it.
Good players don't need the survivability, and kill hordes faster.
This video has inspired me to look at my Zealot again. I am a knife bleed addict so I am looking to change up to an axe or chainsword. See what I can do.
Posting comment on jan 24 2023 in case they fix this, the knife build has a secret bonus for killing Crusher/Mauler/armor. There's... we'll call it an Unintended Feature, with the stack damage of both bleed and flame, using your dash causes the stacks to ignore armor reduction, meaning for ~3 seconds it will do 300+ damage per tick, so you can stack up the bleed on a number of targets and do an empty dash and they will all die, this will also work with the Flamer. It's stupid, and I don't think it changes anything else about the knife but it IS slightly better currently than it's being made out to be to deal with heavy armor characters.
Furthermore, the Thunder hammer's weakness continues in that its actual cleave value is quite low for its swing speed and in higher difficulties (Heresy+Damnation) the sheer number of attackers can cause serious issues where the weapon will Dead Stop on light enemies with alarming regularity. against true hordes the T-hammer is Very weak as a primary choice. And I say this as a T-hammer main, I love this thing, but its weaknesses are something I have become intimately familiar with.
(As an aside, I think that the Devil's Claw weapons need some kind of buff, the buff I'd LIKE to see is increasing the stagger value of the parry attack IMMENSELY. maybe 25 stagger? so it blows things off their feet on stagger, making it more useful as a Duelist weapon against stronger targets, this specific buff would make it more viable in higher levels because it gives an answer to the 4 rager problem that you otherwise run Deep into, also helps against 4 maulers, or even a single Crusher/Bulwark, my 2 cents)
The way to get the most out of many weapons in the game is by mixing light and heavy attacks. Some weapons that seem weak can string horde clearing attacks by mixing lights and heavies. Also on combat axes the fact that you can stun lock berserkers with the special attack makes them much better than people initially think. One thing fat shark does well is weapon design, just some weapons have a higher skill cap. You can't just mash all light attacks or all heavy attacks, that might work on lower difficulties but to use them on higher you need to push, dodge and mix attacks.
I've been experimenting with the mixes.
4:19 .... For zealot, tactical axe is definitely tier 1 especially if your going for crit build.
For one, they have similar crit chance as the catacan knife while additionally having the critical bonus on their modifier, which means the zealot will near permanently get 75 percent damage reduction during on melee. And having high mobility and attack speed does help with your survival if you're just skilled enough too.
I know they are weak vs crowd but you can solve that easily if you just get one with the brutal momentum blessing, which is same for all the axes.
You haven't played zealot until you go full berserk with this thing on your hand. It's unmatched with any other weapon I tried
10:15 With Antex axe, you don't really need brutal momentum, unlike other axes. What was missing in the intruduction on these babes is, their push attack IS the brutal momentum. If there's a crowd, just repeat push attack. It's much faster than just normal attack too btw. Brutal momentum just spice it up real nice.
12:30 Tip on using the eviscerator, if there are armored elites in the mob, try vertical alt heavy attack.(or was it push attack?)
It will just cleave through the pox walkers and alt will only trigger upon hitting the elites.
I noticed that you can charge the crusher really fast if you press charge and then instantly block and then do a hit
Great info as usual. Thanks Sparticus.
#1 S-tier is chain axe, because it sounds cool when I hit things. The rest of the list doesn't matter.
On a serious note:
Achylis combat axe: the lights are better for flak, unarmored, maniac, and infected. Only use the heavies for unyielding and carapace. It also gets brutal momentum, but it's harder to use that cleave because of the vertical swipes. Solid weapon.
MK II Tac Axe, use the same build as the knife and it performs very similar with better AP. Should be higher up.
Chain axe heavies have poor cleave and are slow, only use the light unless you have it revved and need to kill one target. Lights actually hit twice, so the number shown is deceptive. Check the rev stat for truer numbers. The shove attack is your only reliable CC on it, follow up with two swings, repeat in hordes. I suggest pairing with a gun that can thin out hordes: shotty, braced, infantry auto, flamer.
Chain sword - lights have GREAT movest, fast swing speed, high crit, narrow strikes, does just as much damage as heavies, so spam these against few targets. Heavies are awesome for CC, fast, repeatable startup, great cleave. Shove attack sucks, literal stab. Good damage, just bad follow-up to a shove that only hits one target and easily misses. Activate for specials and elites. Only weakness is short range, easily noticeable between it and eviscerator.
Shove attack seems like it would nice to connect the special.
The chain Axe camera issue can be mitigated by reducing the "Camera Sway" slider in the options. It doesn't go away, but it feels less "yoink"y
For the other 2 heavy sword variants: Instead of special-heavy, do special-push stab-heavy. The push can stagger trash mobs around the elite you're focusing on, making your following attacks safer, and the stab has a much higher crit rate than other attacks, then the last heavy is an overhead.
Mark 7 especially has its light 2/3/4 as relentless instead of vanguard like Mark 9 does, which has a very high stagger value and can even continue the stagger from the special against Dreg Ragers.
Also a horizontal heavy can crit on multiple elites while used during Chastise the Wicked (the dash), deleting multiple gunners when they're stacked, making Mark 7 much more versatile than Mark 9.
I've got a regular Assault Chainsword with the 5% Shred (5 stacks = 25%crit) and Devastating Strike (ignore hit mass on crit) blessings. Combined with a stub revolver with 4% Crucian Roulette and the extra 30% crit against bleeding Feat, I'm getting ~97% crit chance. The devastating strike is working overtime on this build and just mulches hordes even when there's a bunch of flak thrown into the mix. Against carapace, the high crit gets around most of the damage reduction so mindlessly spamming light attacks is somewhat viable. Only enemy that causes an issue are Bulwarks, which require side stepping their swing and revving up the chainsword to get around the shield. Biggest issue is the chainsword is currently bugged so occasionally hitting with a revved attack only hits for the first tick of 18 damage and cancels before doing more damage
Get thrust on the thunder hammer and it really comes into its own. Just absurd single target charged heavies and consistent very high horde clear with non charged heavies.
And you actually missed its biggest weakness - complete lack of cleave on charged heavy. If you swing it into a horde charged you turn precisely one nurglite into paste... and then... it bounces off them like you hit a wall. #feelsbadman.
But my buddy who zealot mains only runs it and its a HUGE addition to the team for big boi clear on damnation highs. I rolled mine properly (one of the power blessings tier 4 and tier 3 thrust) and its game changing. 2 shots daemon hosts with ult and proper feats ON DAMNATION.
EASY C tier - I'd prob put it at B for its single target clear.
Mk IV chain axe is best weapon hands down now. Its light attacks will stun ragers, maulers, even crushers allowing you to just unload on them. It has good horde clear, rips up boss shields, does good damage to monstrosities, and it's simple as hell to use. Single target? Tap. Aoe? Hold. Combined with zealot attack speed it's simply glorious.
My experience with the catachan vs the heavy sword is that the catachan is safer due to higher stagger, and the heavy attacks have a flatter pattern which makes aiming for the head easier, but that the devil sword does less damage. Personally, Kruber and Sienna's 1h sword in vermintide was my favorite move set and this holds true in darktide with the mk1 devil sword and power sword.
For me, I'm less worried about the damage. It's all about the attack pattern. I love the Mk XI heavy sword for the vanguard light attack spam. Same with the Ogryn's Mk III cleaver. If I need to focus down a Crusher or Mutant, then I can mag dump with a bolter. As you mentioned.
I've yet to dive into the blessing options for the Zealot (or any human character) as I main Ogryn. When I'm happy with my Ogryn's weapon options, then I'll probably take a closer look at the Zealot.
After sinking a lot of time into this game and playing around with all the melee weapons I find that they all are great and viable as long as you make up for specific weapon weakness with the right gun and or blessings/perks, here are some weapons that that I find are fun to use.
1 mk 1 catachan for is ease of use and defense parry.
2 mk 4 catachan the overhead strike on this sword does the highest damage out of all traditional sword like weapons and makes short work of all enemies except carapace, also has decent horde clear.
3 chain axe it's like a tac axe but with more damage slightly less swing speed but not by much and great defense also best shredder in the game rips all heretics to pieces, the camera problem is not really an issue as you can simply hold block if it swings your cam down or just cancel chainsaw midway if you need to.
4 mk 2 tac axe super mobile extremely fast attacks good charged heavy's you can dance around enemies and hordes with this fun weapon.
5 Thunder hammer because top tier bonks of course, absolutely destroys monstrosities and every other tough enemy, can swap cancel after charged strike to negate the the animation lock.
I'd love a Zealot ranged weapons list. I find myself grabbing either the Bolter, Revolver or Flamer depending on the situation and haven't branched out beyond the occasional shotgun usage.
Braced autoguns can be nice!
MGXII is bae
@@earlefinlay3682 don't get me wrong that thing is a workhorse but I don't think it's best in the hands of a zealot.
@@scottschiess1440 this^
Flamer is best hands down if you have no horde clearer on your team.
Revolver is best if you don't need the flamer and you're mostly a melee zealot and just need something to take out the occasional pesky enemies. The fast swap makes killing the most problematic enemies (snipers, bombers, trappers, gunners, shot gunners) easy.
Bolter is best if no one on your team is good against armor. Otherwise, its slow swap speed is a detriment unless you're mainly playing ranged (play a veteran then!)
Kantrel XII is best if no one on your team is good at taking out ranged enemies. If this is the case though you should be playing Veteran.
All the guns can work though, but I would say Flamer or Revolver are usually the best picks.
This pairs really well with their apology email.
My problem with rating things is that I stay stuck on Malice because my quickplay teams don't stay alive well with my Zealot. (My best friend just upgraded his computer so that he can play Darktide - he was still on Win 7 haha. Hopefully a long-term buddy in the game.) On Malice, I'm saving teams from crazy/ insane situations as Ogryn that should and do kill off my Zealot. If I take flamer, I'm completely giving up anti-sniper. It's a conundrum for opinions because the threat mix is different.
I just started leveling my Zealot class, and my character is a weirdo, I like to leave him in mostly prison garn or colorful pants and using mostly combat knife. Not always most efficient, but so fun to be like a quick unhinged ninja.
Watched this purely to see where Thunder Hammer ends up.
My rebuttal: Skill Issue
Flamer + Thunderhammer. Crushers surrounded by trash?
Torch the crowd, it staggers the Crusher. A good rolled thunderhammer will already ruin a crusher, perfect TH can outright oneshot them with Chastise.
The recovery on charged attacks is kind of necessary or else it would be god tier.
You can still get most of the crowd control out of the Catachan mark 4 by using the Light-Heavy combo, trading the double sweeping heavy for only 1 every other attack, but it does considerably more heavy attack damage than the other two for some arbitrary reason and it does have a strikedown for dealing with lone enemies. The mark 7 is the odd one out with both low damage and singular heavy on the horizontal combo, plus its animation sequence for using its own strikedown combo is awkward and easy to mess up in real gameplay.
I like the mkVII because its heavy chain starts with a sweep so it's easier to go directly into it, which has more utility than starting with a vertical attack.
I have noted the relatively poor ability of the heavy vertical to actually kill things.
Also, I do like that a lot of the weapons can be effective at a lot of the difficulties. Let’s me have more choices than being pigeon holed into 1 or 2 “meta”. It’s more the case at lower difficulties, but I just got done watching a guy in damnation using a catachan bleed build.
The load i always end up with is Hammer/Bolter. The quick heavy swings of the hammer just let me wade through hordes with 0 cares in the world. In a pinch, if there's a big boy, the thunder/ full charged heavy usually takes them out when you add in dmg from team. But ideally, i like to pull out the rupture bolter, quick burst, and crushers are gone in literal moments. I had a ton of fun e the Evi, but i still think i can control the field better w the hammer.
Using heavy sword vii with power and dmg trait, more toughness on kill and impact talent with bolter. With the huge amount of stagger on light combo an 7+ cleave targets its easily able to tank and delete hordes alone on damnation, something the IX was a lot weaker at.
Also want to add that the MK 9 heavy sword can be really strong and fun to use, that flurry of cleave damage with its versatility makes it feel A tier to me.
Yep, for me it's all about the attack pattern, and the Mk XI heavy sword wins hands down.
Still use devil claw mk 1 for horde clearing, I still love the parry against enemy for rager just fun for me
You can usually get the Chainaxe camera issue to proc when you rev and hit the Mutant in the head.
Please try Mk I Devils Claw with devastating strike (crits ignore enemy mass), a Crucian Roulette gun and the talent that crits reduce cooldown of alt. In a horde you can reset your alt in 1 or 2 swings. It’s fun and definitely works in T4
What's an alt? Alternative?
@@Bertoleyus 99% certain he means ult (Chastise the Wicked) since bleed reduces cooldown with the lv 30 feat to do so. I've been trying the feat....
@@Bertoleyus I meant to write ult, the zealot charge.
After grinding lots of hours with the Antax, I became a worse player in general
you can heal up to full with your passive talent with 320 max health, wasn't even using my F once
Could use an update incorporating proper blessings. Heavy Sword IX not in A tier...
Hammer works really well in its limited niche of good solid horde control in my opinion, but your points to the negatives all stand, too. A bolter or agripinaa braced autogun helps a lot but you're still seriously limited by that annoying lack of armor piercing capability. In that regard I do not quite see why you placed the hammer so low yet the annoyingly spammed charged crusher maul so high when they do a lot of the same with the hammer having better spikes while underperforming everywhere else. Hammer is still much more usable imo than both non-eviscerator chain weapons.
While my favorite weapon is actually one of the tactical axes with brutal momentum, I agree with all the reasoning and points made in this video primarily because I feel like most other weapons are entirely dependent on getting good blessings.
imo combat knife excels at disrupting a wave, dividing a horde between the zealot taking aggro, dancing around the enemies, forcing the ranged enemies to become melee like a pseudo-ogryn, while the rest of the team cleans up after the bleed stacks
For cmbat knife and some other weapons (single shot lasers) use auto-fire. I have it set on 4th mouse button. I also use 5th mouse button for aim toggle.
My experience with Zealot was when I swapped to Thunder Hammer mid way thru leveling my Zealot, I found myself getting my butt kicked melee'ing groups. I switched to Crusher and it was better, but I was still getting hurt more than I liked. I swapped to Combat Blade and melee combat became far less scary, in fact I started to really enjoy melee combat. Then I got an Antax and it was definitely more like the combat blade than the Crusher/TH but it also did a ton of damage.
The Thunder Hammer and Crusher were just far too slow plus it screws with your mobility and that was really screwing with my play style.
I had the same experience with a thunder hammer while leveling. I suspect it gets a buff next pass but even so, I'm curious what I can do with one with decent blessings.
Thunderhammer is like the Plasmagun on the Veteran. It takes practice, and scales significantly with a few key offensive blessings and taking the can't be stunned by melee attacks skill (instead of the heal when in your invuln state) which wills ave you significantly more often then the heal on death skill because you can chain all your heavy attacks without being interrupted thus doing significantly more damage faster.
@@auretioustaak6579 OK, that gives me something to work with. While leveling I took the "can't be stunned" too. I've never been able to make the heal work well yet and the thunder hammer feels like it needs to avoid interrupts as much as possible. What blessings do you like? ...I'm doing well with an Eviscerator/ Boltgun combo at the moment but I want to make that thunder hammer work!
@@OffToBattle there's another youtuber called "Claysthetics" who did a discussion video of the open letter/patch notes. Someone in the comments asked me the same thing as I main thunderhammer and boltgun. I did a long multi-post (it's like 5 comments long because of character limits) response in detail over there. There's 12 or so comments attached to it. Jump over there and read through my response there.
@@auretioustaak6579 I've spoken to Clay myself. Thanks, I'll look into more detail there. I was trying the hammer today actually. I like it, it's just tougher in practice because quickplay teammates are inherently random. Anyway, will follow up. Take care!
Edit: Found it!
combat blade with headhunter autogun (crucian roulette) just murders everything
Strong disagree about Heavy Sword. With the right blessings, assuming you have a decent heavy armour elite killer in your squad, its a god tier horde clear / survival weapon with great cleave and damage. It thrives when you are literally drowning in more lightly armoured enemies. You can “swim” in the horde and nothing can touch you. My second favorite melee weapon for the Preacher class, just behind Crusher.
Chainsword for me. Very good in Heresy, bit underpowered in Damnation.
Only heavy attacks, swipes left and right, good crowd control. Alt mode for single target very effective IMO, good block-push against doggies and poxbursters.
Damnation, needs more power (10%), for more stagger on mobs, but still viable. Maybe I should try the Eviscerator again, didn't like the awkward swipe angles on heavy attacks.
I like those weapons, they require some thought and movement, and not just spamming attacks.
Heavy swords
Model XI has all Vanguard light attacks and is the only sword in the family to have 3 heavy attacks in a combo, and two of them are Vanguard.
Everything is simple for me, light attacks for trash and hordes, heavy attacks for elites and specialists.
My favorite is the Turtolsky Mk VI Heavy Sword, it has the tastiest light attack patterns and effective heavy attacks.
Devastating Strike on Turtolsky Mk VI Heavy Sword + Crucian Roulette on Zarona Mk IIa Quickdraw Stub Revolver = GodRoll
UP: Crucian Roulette nerfed after patch, but Turtolsky Mk VI Heavy Sword still wroth it
Interesting to see that none of these weapons come close to the Bull Butcher with a Slaugtherer blessing on it. I would have assumed a Heavy Sword would.
Yeah, the Mk II Cleaver is easily S tier. I've got some decent rolls on mine. I'm just waiting for them to let us reroll blessings before i upgrade it.
Hey, Sparty. Which classes do you like the most - if you had to rank them?
I prefer the Eviscerator because of 3 things. Horde clear, single target damage, and VVVVRRRRRR!
I like the Idea of the Thunder Hammer, but its not as useful as I had imagined it would be.
Haven't tried the axe, or the mace aince launch thou. Maybe they're better than I remember.
I wish they would put the push attack stats in the attack breakdowns.
Nice tier list and also nice explanations. I have to disagree with some things you say though. And yes I only play Damnation and have lots and lots of hours into the game. 2 things basically: You don't talk enough about crits and the inherent %-increase in some weapons. Tac Axes for example should be way higher. A good Mark 2 or even 4 with Brutal Momentum is an easy A. The second thing you almost totally neglect is movability. It is obvious that you prefer the slower weapons (Antax, Evi, Crusher) and that is fine when you like that playstyle. For me personally i hate to play slow and the movement speed from the combat blade makes it an S for me. While you have to be a sitting duck in your backline when too many shooters are in front... waiting for your F to recharge, I am already in that enemy backline with my combat blade, killing all the gunners and reapers and giving my team room to breathe. This makes it even a really good support weapon for the team, since you can rush in without needing to F.
Our Zealot is playing combat blade+bolter and reduce F with crit. You can basically spam F every 5-8seconds and just be at the back line and killing everything.
If you use speed up from heavy and slide. You are just running all over the place.
Also with Mercy killer your dmg output goes really high
The only melee weapons I use for my zealot are the eviscerator, thunder hammer, and now power maul. I use the eviscerator as my main heresy + weapon; but the power maul is growing on me. The thunder hammer is my favourite weapon of the bunch; but that animation lock makes it an unwise choice for heresy +.
Pair the thunderhammer with the can't be stunned in melee, and get slaughterer and either headtaker or thrust on it and you'll immediately feel a power spike. The animation lock is the thing everyone bitches about but it's a a balancer to someone who can chain off of a group of enemies (thanks to blessing's triggering the best off of them) and 4 to 5 tap a plague ogryn or demonhost solo on Damnation. It is far more reliable in Damnation then many of the other weapons, because whilst it won't clear hordes stupidly fast, you can in effect stunlock whole hordes with good cc and impact and just hold chokes solo, assuming nothing is shooting at you then you get to be aggressive and work through top them or pull back etc. Don't forget it has a decent reach which thanks to attacking through walls and doors being a thing, is surprisingly good overall. A good thunderhammer on someone that has practiced with it and understands the nuances of it, can solo, without tanks/other people demonhosts on heresy or below and kill them faster then the time it takes for the rest of the squad to shit bricks and creep around them. That alone is reason enough to learn how to use the thunderhammer properly.
I recommend Mk I Devil's Claw for the crit/bleed build on Zealot (the +% to crit perk and the Shred blessing are a must, have fun with rest).
I never used the Antax. Until now. I'm an Eviscerater and T Hammer lover. The Axe 🪓 just feels so meaty and efficient
I use chain axe with flamer, cover the ones weakness with the other, chain axe for single targets.
I got lucky with my MK VII heavy sword. 380 base, max cleave and max damage. Never use heavy attack with it, the light attack destroys hordes like they are nothing. Defo my favourite weapon now.
why is limbsplitter a blessing man
I do have to disagree with the hate/low grade for the tactical axe. With the critical bonus and finesse bonuses you can get insane critical hit change with shred and the right Feats. I can melt through elites on Damnation pretty insanely fast. Hord clear is the obvious lacking element, but honestly the mobility makes it a non-issue. You can push, dodge as you attack and have no issues soloing large hords. I also really appreciate the fast attack speed. Maybe it's not "meta" but it's my favorite so far and I feel its better that D/C.
Thunderhammer with my build on damnation 1 hits all Ogryns including Crushers, 4 hits Daemons, 3 hits the Ogryn boss and 3 to 5 hits on beast of nurgle to kill them..... It is also great for horde clearing if used correctly.... So I very much disagree that its C tier.
I got brutal momentum on an Achlys and I must say that it is a great weapon. I get so much utility out of it.
It definitely surprised me. I'm still looking for an antax. By the way turn your sway down in options for camera that will help with some weapons like chainaxe.
why did you discuss brutal momentum in relation to the combat axes but not the tactical axes? You talked about the cleave with the tactical axes, but their entire focus is on crit builds designed to hit weak spots which can activate brutal momentum, allowing them to cleave very effectively. They definitely aren't in the same tier as combat axes, but it feels like this wasn't really considered.
for me, the crusher is the best because flat out it will put a ranged unit thats like 8 to 10m out permanently on its ass or make it perma staggered meaning it cant shoot me and has to wait its turn to die to me or my allies
Sparty, as @deleted axion (don't know how to tag people) said, weapon is not bad it you can't mindlessly slash with light or heavy attack or just use special attack because you also have bash attack and with some weapons you have to combine light qnd heavy and sometimes you have to do different combos like L L H, some have L H H, some L H L H and so on AND besides that, some weapons, for example "bad" heavy swords or catachan ones require using things like bash attack and first heavy for armor and light then second heavy for horde, or maybe special attack then charged for single target burst and light, bash and 2nd or third charged for hordes. I was just making hypothetical example but my point is, skill ceeling for some weapons is higher, it doesn't mean they are worse. Think outside the box. Some are just better or worse, like thunder hammer being worse then crusher period and ogryn cleavers being great example by i think mk3 having biggest damage stat-wise, best AoE AND the quickest (you can use light heavy combo or just smash light for hordes) yet it still had great single target strike in first charged then you can special for stun and repeat while the other one, 6 i think is just stabby and had horrible AoE horde clear while having lower damage aswell for some reaaon...
it’s interesting looking at different tier lists from diff creators. some say the crusher is terrible, others say its amazing. but everyone agrees the antax is broken lol
The war hammer 40k universe gets darker the more you read into the lore
with Brutal Momentum blessing on most weapons that have it they easily become A+ / S tier. Especially the hatchets.
The Knife shouldnt out proform any weapon in damage, it gives you speed and dodge and that's what helps it keep up :D
the dagger is amazing if and only if you have giga rolls, 360-380 bass plus blessings
Hey, really interesting video! Some things I agree with, some I don't, but I find your feedback really intersting! I'd love to see your take on the ranged weapons and why the shotgun is number one! XD
The dagger for me with bleed , it kicks butt
i would have swapped antax and eviscerator but otherwise yeah i kinda agree, i feel like on damnation the hoard clear is slightly more, and is therefore more valuble but thats just me
it feels to me like brutal momentum is just as good on tac axes as it is on the combat axes.
15:00 warning, you rolled a god blessing with that one, its not supposed to be that strong, i have slaughter on my bull butcher knife and it just outshine every other bull butchers i have
Question, what do you like for a ranged weapon to offset it? I don't remember if I have that trait on a bull butcher but I have it on "a" cleaver for sure.
@@OffToBattle i've tried everything but i can only find myself with bull butcher and blastoom grenade gauntlet launcher for the ogryn (+25% unyelding damage)
i really need the gauntlet to do well against ragers, maulers, crushers and bullworks, you can get it to do 550 dmg to crushers with the falcon punch without the 50% ogryn dmg trait (750 with the trait 3 shotting them in damnation), falcon punch against elites (special attack) and the normal attack against shooters, reapers and also bullworks (the game calls it secondary action attack when you aim)
but you always want to refine your ranged for unyelding because bosses are a nightmare in damnation
i tried other knives but i really prefer the bull butcher even without the slaughter blessing, slaugther blessing just bring it to power sword level of shit clear capabilities
instead of going with the 50% dmg reducion and more damage to ogryns i prefer the box of grenades upgrade, just to do more damage to bosses with that (beast of nurgle is your worst opponent), but is also kinda nice if you hit flak or carapace armor in the middle of a big horde
in melee i just use the gauntlet rarely to save ammo when i finish off crushers, the gauntlet heavy attack do a little more damage then any cleaver heavys to carapace, but does a lot more stagger than the cleavers, you make them sit down by just smaking them with the launcher
How do feat choices change your weapon rankings?
I like the tactical axes with the crit build and brutal moment blessings. Been super fun for me
You're sleeping on tac axes. Tac axes especially the 7 makes damnations extremely easy, you can stagger any special/Elite, have great maneuverability, synergizes with crit which makes you insanely tanky, and attacks very fast stacking blessings extremely fast. Top blessings for Aatrox IMO are Shredder, Brutal Momentum, and the two blessings IDR the names that give % power on hit, and % power on chained attack.
I developed a lot of respect for the tac axe when playing Veteran and Psyker, actually.
Is the thunder hammer still C tier?
Woot dude! Thanks
I think the Parry can completely block a Crushers heavy blow.
Im surprised with Catachan Mk IV being lowest possible tear, it has very high heavy attack dmg. Combo Light -> Heavy -> Light -> Heavy have one of fastest horde clear i saw in game, with high mobility. Dmg against armor is low thats true but certainly doesnt deserve F tier imho.
Doesn’t the bock slab of the heavy sword do a ton of damage?
Also, if the hammer didn’t have the self stun it would be S tier for me
Even without the self stun it has one big issue for me.
The charged attack does no cleave and specials/elites you want to smash with it are often among a mob of chaff.
I agree with the whole list.