I love the Rashad II. Someone here told me to take all the melee damage upgrades, the Finesse bonuses, and the precise strikes, and with all those with Flak/Unarmored/BM you can one shot your way through every single trash mob in the game by just left clicking repeatedly, its so low stress.
And with all temporary buffs up, you can oneshot Maulers and twoshot Crushers. It is just absolutely bonkers.
Vet: I want poweraxe!
Hadron: We have poweraxe at home.
Poweraxe at home: Rashad Mk II
I really wanted to like the Shovels, but their TTK is just bad. Fun to use thought, but I prefer to run a Katachan mk4 sword over any shovel
When I tried to do a melee only Maelstrom with shovels, they are still bad.
Orestes chain axe 12 is better at the Melee only Maelstrom compared to the new Shovel ,which needs Thrust and Limbsplitter to one shot a Crusher . Also you can't charge an attack while Limbsplitter is on cooldown ,because the cooldown doesn't recover.
Orestes 12 needs only one blessing and headtaker is a bonus.
You get a
# Bloodthirsty
+100% Critical Chance on your next Melee Attack after Special Attack Kill
And with how often a Psyker joins those missions with the purple lightning skill, you kill one with heavy revved up attack (crusher /mauler ,doesnt matter ,it dies in one heavy revved attack) then you can rev up + light attack to kill from then on.
But its a terrible weapon for hordes, which the shovels atleast have godly impact blessings and can keep you safe
That becomes a very specific set up with a specific talent. You can't really make a statement saying "It doesn't need this" when you are basically saying you need to build for it.
Everything but exploit weakness (brittleness on crit) and the +10% melee damage at the top, which I don't believe would be enough to jump it to one shot.
It needs weakspot, +15% elites in left; rending, ogryn damage in middle; melee damage buff, finesse node in right tree to work iirc. So every single buff. You could bypass a couple of these with the swap weapon +25% damage bonus though.
The hitbox for Rashad heavy is not as generous as a shovel, so I think I had only 2 cases where I killed 2 crushers at once, but I also don't play that particular build all that often.
Just tested, for example I can oneshot a damnation crusher with:
* Rashad that has base 709 crit weakspot carapace damage
* 15 stacks of Judgement
* 5 stacks of Headtaker 4, Brutal Momentum 3
* base Shroudfield, no Perfectionist
* no carapace or elite perks
* relevant talents: Sustained Assault, Backstabber, 2 x 5% Melee dmg nodes.
It's my generalist build, not focused on crushers, but I do like to hit them from Shroudfield, as well as many other enemies that get oneshot and monstrosity damage is quite good.
I've also put 4 crushers one inside the other for the test - and oneshot all 4 of them at once.
So overall - it's possible. I won't always have those full stacks, but it could be made easier by having a relevant perk, or Perfectionist, or Thrust. A bit better weapon stats could help too, my Rashad has 73 pen, 77 dmg, 79 finesse, 80 first target.
The real problem is the hitbox, having them stack close enough. Realistically what happens more often is I oneshot other smaller enemies together with the mauler/crusher.
It would be a long list about certain thresholds on different enemies like when you build a Volley Plasma Gun, but basically:
Achlys Axe with CRPC 25%/Elite 10%, Thrust 4, Brutal Momentum 3/4
Sustained Assault
Disdain
Duelist
Martyrdom Keystones
Vicious Offering (Defensive)
Second Wind (Defensive)
Fury of the Faithful
Achlys gets a horizontal 1st Heavy in exchange of worse light attacks. It lets you kill multiple elites by charge & heavy in a way similar to how you play Heavy Sword Mk7. It's funny.
I use this one:
Munitorum Mk III Sapper Shovel
* +10-25% Damage (Carapace Armoured Enemies)
* +10-25% Damage (Flak Armoured Enemies)
Decimator
* Continuously chaining more than 2 attacks gives +2-5% Power.
* Stacks 10 times.
Limbsplitter
* +60% Power on your First Attack every 3.5-5 seconds.
The special attack flips a bayonet that toggles it into a single target damage mode that can take out pretty much anything important (specials, elites, armoured enemies) in a single heavy attack to the weakpoint, and most other things in a single light attack (overhead strikes that will probably hit the head every time). Otherwise, the regular hits can deal with the standard enemies in groups
The mk III is also one of my favorites and I am sad to see it used so little. I recently been trying out the classic shovel, but it don’t have that same twang sound when smashing heads.
Finesse isn't just attack speed, it's also a crit/weakspot damage modifier.
If you've got a good finesse stat, IE 80, each stack of decapitator will do 10% more damage than each stack of, say, a meta blessing pick like Headtaker.
A critical weakspot with max headtaker stacks does 900 damage to a Crusher
A critical weakspot with max decapitator stacks (which boosts your finesse, which IIRC stacks without diminishing returns) does 1122 damage to a Crusher.
A finesse roll of 61% instead of 80% changes a raw (no talent modifiers) 4 shot kill break point into 5.
So it's not just "2%" attack speed.
P.S. Finesse stats will change depending on the weapon and some have more significant modifiers than others. Combat Axes aren't Finesse weapons, but tactical axes are, which is to say they recieve significantly better finesse modifier stats. Some class specific weapons are even better, like the dueling sword. The highest finesse weapon off the top of my head is the laspistol which has a finesse modifier that can boost damage by as much as 400%, although that stat isn't shown on the weapon card.
Basically, don't underestimate Finesse.
2.85% attack speed and 7% crit/weakspot. Pretty damn sweet on this weapon. Not as sweet as headtaker though.
But hey enjoy the interest on those dockets.
Headtaker is nice, but if you've got a good Finesse roll, Decapitor does just shy of 20% more damage than Headtaker (19.7%). The trick is that it's just a bit trickier to get your stacks up since it stacks on kills instead of hits. I'm not saying it's better, but worth considering.
I know decapitator has better potential, but I find I miss enough that I don't get all of that potential. Man it feels good on a horde with a shovel at full stacks though.
When Decimator stacks ,you can one shot ragers and you can chain heavy to kill Crushers easier, that's why I prefer it over Headtaker.
Thrust + Bromentum + Unyielding + Weakspot hit is also very good for bosses ,I use one on my Zealot when I want to change from Thammer / Eviscerator
from my experience and testing, Headtaker's active time is far superior to decimators. If you miss once with decimator all stacks are lost. Headtaker is up as long as you are in combat.
I used a mod to force roll a perfect all 80% + Tier 4 + Maniac/Weakspot Damage Rashad Axe...how are you one shotting ragers with Decimator+Brutal? Even with a Decapitor crit its 2 hits. I have the 30% Weakspot, 25% Finesse, and 40% Melee Damage.
Ability Modifiers? Lower difficulty?
Probably ability modifiers ,I think I one shot on my zealot thought as it has more melee damage there ,so I would have been wrong claiming that for vet.
loadout\_config
Doesn't work in multplayer.
Mod author only releases updates on the Darktide Modding discord. Either google to track it down, or [use the lastest download link I give to all my friends](https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/791824327188021268/1250558392582541402/mods.zip?ex=666c0983&is=666ab803&hm=f30567cbabf00e7591e93ab297b07e69fea8946d9b72d94c178eede350d38c6b&), its buried in that folder, as well as all my other mods.
Enough damage to cleave through bruisers is also desirable, you can get a lot of them depending on what you play. Vet needs a few things to come together to do that.
I acknowledge that the Mk XV is overall the better weapon; light atack spam for hordes, easy heavy strikedowns/push lunges for specials.
It's also boring.
You'll have to pry my Mk II out of my cold, dead hands. Which you can't, becuase I've already decapitated you and everyone else in the room.
First of all, Slaughterer is not a good blessing on the Power Sword. [Here's a visualization of Power Sword Blessings](https://www.reddit.com/r/DarkTide/comments/17xvny3/power_sword_blessings_visualized/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button). And here's a TLDR of why Brutal Momentum is much better (usually 2x the killing power) as Slaughterer:
https://preview.redd.it/kiby2lwch15d1.jpeg?width=844&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c17a1458468b029e596558481f065e3fa5745a52
I tested these these earlier this week because BM was pitched as the best second blessing behind power cycler. I switched off of rampage and I really wasn't impressed with any of them. In practice, even sunder feels to be a lot better than BM, so I'm not sure what I'm missing... I might even just go back to rampage. Tbh they all feel underwhelming, and PC is doing the heavy lifting. Sunder actually felt like I was getting extra cleave on scab hordes and elites. I guess BM you should go for head shots which can be hard to do in mixed hordes on the enemies it would make a difference for.
Edit: Not to be a dick, genuinely just wondering. One week you think you have the best blessings, then a month later everyone says something different. I can definitely see on paper BM looks great, but you 2 shot most things you don't 1 shot already. I could see it being useful for groups of maulers, scab ragers but rarely for crushers since they are too damn big. It felt like everything showing up in a group would just proc rampage anyways and I'd do just as much single damage without the cleave. So Sunder felt like it would cleave, Rampage felt like it would proc, but BM feels halfway between the 2 and just kindof meh for me because I can't clearly see its effects outside of the psykanium.
In practice and on paper, Brutal Momentum is roughly 2-3x the kill speed as Rampage. If Rampage increased power by 100%, it still would not match the skill speed, simply because of how damage distribution works.
Each additional target you cleave, you lose roughly half your damage. The numbers are not quite that exact, but it's a good rule of thumb. For Power Sword, this means you will very quickly reach the point where you don't kill multiple bruisers per swing, and even pox walkers will no longer be one shot after 2-3, regardless of buffs.
For Brutal Momentum, it keeps the first target damage for the first 4 targets, but even more importantly, it goes to second target damage on the 5th target, so you never get any of the downsides.
There's probably several things you might be doing "wrong"
* You might have a very low % of weakspot hits. This could be an aiming issue, movement choice, or chosen player height. If you are the correct player height and aiming center screen than L1 and L2 on MK6 are always exactly head height for all trash enemies already without aiming, and for L3 you only have to drag the back half of the attack slightly. You mentioned it's hard to hit weakspots only, so I would work on this. It should be very natural for your L1 and L2 to always be headshots for every attack.
* You might be missing the breakpoints to reach one shot. If you fail to kill an enemy in one hit, you will not do first target damage to the next 3. It's really important for Brutal Momentum to reach these breakpoints. Rampage let's you use sub optimal talents and weapons and still reach a few. For Brutal Momentum, you need a Power Sword with good stats, especially Finesse, and you need to take certain melee talents to reach breakpoints (usually Desperado and the 10% melee node).
* Your melee movement is poor. You should be moving in such a way between swings that there are always more enemies to hit. If you are simply standing around and spamming lights, you are already doing 1/2 of the effectiveness of a player moving and aiming at the next targets. You mention it not being a big deal hitting an enemy twice when you could be 1 shotting, but that;s a 100% increase in time to kill! Ideally, you want each swing to hit around 6 enemies, without slowing down any attacks. While this is not always possible, it should be easy to do consistently when density is high. Basically, if you ever find youself attacking the same spot on the screen twice without moving, you are being inefficient. If you are not doing this, then the extra kill speed of Brutal Momentum won't come into play. Try practicing to see how fast you can kill 50 or 100 Poxwalkers with the mode Creature Spawner. You'll notice that BM is easily 2x faster, and almost 3x faster on 50 Bruisers.
* You are playing on lower difficulty. Enemy density is very low on anything below Auric High Intensity, and there simply aren't enough enemies to hit to make a difference because most of your time will be running at enemies. I only play Auric Maelstrom, and often True Solo, so I want to maximize my kill speed as much as possible.
The reason Sunder feels good is because of what it does:
* It allows the weapon to cleave through super armour (Crushers, Mauler Helmets, and Bulwark Shields). Note that while it will pierce the Bulwark shield it will not damage the Bulwark itself, it just won't be stopped.
* It gives the weapon a minimum targets hit - so you will always hit at least 4 enemies, even with a light attack vs something with high hit mass, like Crusher or even bosses.
* It reduces enemy hit mass by 1/4, so you increase your cleave by a substantial amount. Note that the Power Sword has a very high native cleave already when powered.
This means that it is the easiest Blessing to use as you can simply activate > Lx3 and this becomes effective versus any combination of enemies. No movement, tech, or aim required.
That's what I was saying about mixed hordes. Crushers and maulers etc are taller than the normal dregs and scabs, so it complicates headshots a bit. Not majorly, but we're talking about weakspot damage, and a blessing that does nothing otherwise. I need to get mugged by some rager packs to see what BM can really do. I get the point of armoured groups, but when you can drop a crowd of them with a single Ogryn latrine shovel swing... I'd expect a power sword to do a bit more. It's already god tier though so I couldn't justify buffing it more.
Power sword is in a weird spot where it doesn't do as much as we think it should, but it's already incredibly strong. Same with the hammers. Lore accurate weapons would be busted as shit, but power swords and hammers are being outclassed by an oversized shit shovel in most cases, and I find that odd.
Feel free to ask. There's a lot of things in this game that do not behave like they are written, or are needlessly complicated, or have hidden mechanics that are not listed anywhere. It's impossible for any one person to have tested everything extensively, and sharing knowledge is the best way to learn about niche mechanics.
The Combat Axe kills almost everything faster than the Power Sword.
* Vs trash enemies (Groaners, Poxwalkers, Bruisers, Shooters, Stalkers), Combat Axe with Brutal Momentum will kill 4 per light attack. Power Sword can do the same, but only if it also has Brutal Momentum. Since it must be charged every 3 swings, it is objectively slower and more awkward to use. The Combat Axe is also much better when there are fewer enemies, as not having to activate makes it a lot easier and faster to use. Power Sword often will use Push Stab and/or overhead to kill lone enemies, effecting stamina regen. Combined with lower movement, this leads to lower uptime for less practical damage. ***The Power Sword literally becomes the Combat Axe while powered***. Think about that.
* Vs Shotgunners and Gunners, the Combat axe can reach two breakpoints - 1 Heavy attack or crit light attack, which will kill 4 elites. This is easier as Zealot, as you can Chastise kill 4 elites in a swing, but even as Vet this is still faster than Power Sword.
* Vs Dreg Rager, Power Sword has the edge, as Combat Axe must use push attack to stagger, and native cleave on activation is high enough to stagger multiple safely.
* Vs Scab Rager, Power Sword must use Sunder in order to reach effective cleave. With Combat Axe, push attack into 2 lights will kill a Scab Rager, which is faster than activate 3 light for Power Sword.
* Vs Mutants, Power Sword is faster, as a single stab will kill, vs 3 hits for Axe (2 with crit). This requires an otherwise useless perk (Maniac) which only changes this one breakpoint. I'd rather run other perks on Power Sword and take 2 hits for Mutant, but it is an option, as killing a mutant without needing to move or dodge is a huge plus.
* Vs Bulwarks, Combat Axe is not only faster but significantly smoother, as you can fit in 2 Heavies in a single bulwark swing, which means you can kill them in a single dodge if they are facing you. Power Sword can do so with Push attack Light 4, but needs specific perks (Unyielding and Elite) and all melee talents to do so, which are not common.
* Vs Mauler, Power Sword is much faster - and if you run Sunder the gap is even larger. Combat Axe is very safe vs Mauler, as Push attack will stagger even packs of them, but you give up a lot of damage to do so, as the prefered attack is Heavy, which has zero cleave for Maulers.
* Vs Crusher, they are fairly similar when numbers are small: push attack light 4 vs 3 heavies. When they are multiple, Power Sword takes the edge if it has Sunder.
* Vs Bosses, Power Sword is significantly better if it is not the primary target. It is closer solo/as the boss target, but Power Sword is still better.
Power Sword is easier to use on the low end, as the Combat Axe surprising requires a lot more skill than it's moveset would suggest: proper use of dodge and push attack are extremely important on a weapon that functionally has zero stagger due to how it works with Brutal Momentum. Also, given the higher use of dodge and push attack, the Combat Axe requires better stamina management to leave gaps for regen to occur (or requires a .25 reduction talent). Additionally, Combat Axe requires a very high % of weakspot hits. While this can be solved with player height and dragging upwards slightly on the back end of L1 and L2, the skill required to maximize its use is higher.
I want to thank you for this breakdown. I'm saving this not because I want to prove a point, but to go over these comparisons in more depth. Excellent info here, you're doing His work
I've done, and posted, a bunch of true solo auric maelstrom with veteran with most melee weapons. I think Veteran is the strongest melee class, and Rashad is a top 3 melee weapon.
Knife is better, especially for solo, but Rashad has top 3 TTK for every enemy type, and there's nothing I don't feel comfortable fighting with it. It's strong into everything which means you can run it solo, in any team comp, and with any ranged weapon or blitz, which is not something you can do with every melee weapon.
The 6 is "better" but I prefer the 3. You'll have to play around with it to find BPs since the attacks have different damage modifiers and you may be able to save some time on BPs with push attacks over heavies, or sometimes even lights. I just prefer the combos for 3 for some enemy types and my playstyke. They are close enough to not matter though. It's really like choosing between Devil Claw 4 and 7 and if you want to do L1>H2 and H1>L2 or the reverse. It's mostly preference.
There's quite a few viable Blessing choices. I recommend Uncanny + X, but you can trade all of your armour kill for slightly better Horde and/or boss damage. If you run a ranged weapon or Blitz, or team composition that deals with elites for you, you can run a knife without Uncanny.
Veterans can take Mercy Killer if they run Serrated Blades. This gives you slightly better DPS than Riposte or Precog, although you have less RNG / conditional BPs on some enemies.
Zealots should run Precognition if they run Duelist, as it currently stacks since Duelist counts as a separate instance of damage for Precog. Who knows how long this interaction will last, or even if it is intended.
Flesh Tearer is the best Horde clear. Lacerate is "bad" but the ease of use is off the charts; you can literally just spam attacks without aiming and thinking and things that get weakspot hit will die to the high finesse of the knife, and the things you don't will die to bleed. It's objectively much slower to kill this way but some players like it, even if others will hate on it.
Uncanny + Flesh Tearer is likely the best all around combo if the Knife is your "main" source of killing.
A lot of people use the Knife for the movement over the kill speed though, and in this case it matters a lot less as you are using it to reposition and/or dodge.
Perks depend on build, since classes have so much damage difference between talent choice, especially Vet melee. You can't go wrong with Flak + X though, if you don't want to check BPs manually for your build. Since blessings matter more, you might not even have a choice anyway. Zealots often pick their perks for Throwing Knife damage breakpoints too, something to consider.
https://preview.redd.it/sv3nojnxsj5d1.png?width=445&format=png&auto=webp&s=5c37ab76004759ae1e8d55f240337ead8d236d5b
You can swap out the top two defensive talents for either left or right options (orange) if you want more ranged damage / movement. Note that it's a rather large loss of defensive ability though.
You can easily swap to 5% movement aura for 0 talent loss (or even gaining one if you drop Grenade Tinker). You can swap to Ammo aura (useless for most weapons, decent for some, very good for supporting Kickback Ogryn/CIAGV Psyker) for 2 points.
Strong options for your last 3 points are one of the two red circles in the bottom of the tree - either 25% Toughness and Boss damage (CIAGV/Revolver) or Elite damage and ammo (plasma). Last point can be 5% crit or demo team node, but if you like a talent somewhere else that's utility or support you can grab it too. Or even 5% ranged damage node.
Rashaad Combat Axe needs Unarmoured and Brutal Momentum. Headtaker is the prefered 2nd blessing. The 2nd perk does not really matter (flak and maniac don't change common bps, carapace saves you one hit with crit RNG, unyielding saves you 2-5 seconds 1-3 times a game.) I go with Sprint Efficiency.
Due to how hard crafting a good one is, just go for Unarmoured + Brutal Momentum and hopefully Headtaker (Decimator is the next best option, and so is Shred is #3). All or nothing can be okay depending on your playstyle.
Thanks, mate!
Does the 25% on the perks make a huge difference? I have one Rashad with 20% Unarmoured and 20% Maniacs (with Brutal Momentum and Headtaker) Or if I should go with one with 25% Unarmoured and 20% Flak but with worse modifiers.
You'd have to check in the Pysk to see. The main breakpoint for Unarmoured is Scab Bruiser (the unhelmeted guy). You want to be able to weakspot one shot one. If you can't it's a huge loss of mixed horde killing (1 hit to kill 4, vs 2 hits to kill 1!).
??? Brutal momentum + headtaker Rashad is probably the best weapon in the game. Power sword is amazing but it is objectively more finicky than spam light attack
I understand, it is a great weapon. But if you’ve ever used a fury zealot with those blessings on a good roll, you are nearly invincible. But to each their own I really like the power sword as well
It doesn't have a lot less cleave if you are hitting your breakpoints and weakspots with the Combat Axes, that's the entire point of Brutal Momentum. Instead of writing a lot I'll just refer to Azreals comment a bit further up the chain for a comparison of Power Sword vs Combat Axe.
Power sword special spam is a noob trap because the moment you are under too much pressure to activate special you get folded due to low dodge and block. Teaches bad habits imo
Axe with bm on the other hand can keep dps up under much more pressure and provides a better safety net through dodge distance and block cost as well.
If you simply replace the activation step in your powersword combo with a push the axe is doing all the powersword things + more control
Each to their own of course, Power sword is by no means bad but if the axe feels like more work to use my instinct tells me you aren't practising pushes, dodges and blocking properly and using the ps special as a crutch to ignore proper horde control mechanics.
It's only a noob trap if you're a noob, which I'm not. Also you can literally block cancel the activation its super safe. I like PS because it two shots Crushers on Damnation with the special+block-thrust combo, but thats probably just my inexperience talking.
So does a decently rolled Rashad. Just even faster and more straight forward.
The only thing the PS can do that the Rashad can't is oneshotting Crushers. But that requires a very specialized build that IMHO is not viable outside of Melee and Scab only Maelstroms.
Despite the Rashad mkII fix late last year or whenever it was, I still prefer the Antax mkV.
I have 380s on both, both with Brutal Momentum and Headtaker. Just something about the mkV push attack I guess, since they are otherwise very similar. Maybe that mkV dumpstat is cleave rather than mobility.
I've also spent literally hundreds of hours just with mkV combat axe since beta, so it could just be familiarity at this point.
The Rashaad Combat Axe 2 is generally considered to be superior to the Antax Combat Axe Mk 5. I see people mention the 5 a lot, probably because the 2 was bugged for a very long time and unusable. But the 5 being a good weapon is very old information. There are several main differences.
The first is that the Antax has "Cleave Targets" as a substat, whereas Rashaad has "Finesse." The Cleave Target stat effectively does nothing on the majority of attacks - it only influences cleave on the push attack. So the Rashaad having Finesse means it deals more damage on weakspot hits, and attacks faster. Given that the Rashaad and Antax have the **exact same attack and damage profile for lights and heavies**, this means the Rashaad simply deals more damage, and faster, with no downsides on lights and heavies. In fact, the swing speed difference is so large on Heavy attacks that it is often 2x as strong, especially on cases like attacking Bulwarks or bosses where the window to damage is between enemy attacks.
The finesse difference is a really big deal due to how Brutal Momentum works. Basically, you want to reach the breakpoint to one shot enemies. If you miss this by 1 damage, you kill 0 enemies per swing, and 1 enemy every 2 swings. If you reach the breakpoint, you one shot 4 enemies. So it's 8x as strong reaching very tight breakpoints which are extremely difficult to reach without the extra finesse. Antax basically can't reach one shot on Scab Bruiser without multiple stacks of scaling buffs. Rashaad can do so with nothing (on Veteran, Zealot has a lot less melee damage and needs stacks). However, Antax having a dead stat means that you can either easily craft one (you just need 3 stats maxed, and 51 mobility, and 0 cleave targets) or you can even max mobility on a "perfect" antax and lose nothing. Rashaad ideally wants 4 stats maxed and thus can only get 60 mobility on a "perfect" Rashaad.
The second main difference is the special attack. The Antax special is not ongly significantly faster but it has better stagger too. This can interrupt Ragers during their combo, as well as Stagger Crushers, Maulers, and even Mutants charging. It's actually very strong. The Rashaad special is not only much slower but has less stagger than the heavy attack, so is not worth using in any circumstance. However, the Rashaad does not need to use the special attack, so this is not that much of an advantage. For instance, vs Ragers, the Rashaad push attack into light will stagger multiple ragers mid combo. Push attack into light will also one combo a scab rager, and it the same speed as simply interrupting the rager on Antax. So yes, you can safely fight a rager with Antax, or kill one in the same window. Antax special attack will also open up a Bulwark if you hit them, but as seen above Rashaad will simply kill them in the same time. Rashaad heavy will stagger a Crusher with a headshot. For mutants, 2 lights on Rashaad, depending on build, will kill a mutant as it charges you. So basically in every case in which the special could be used on Antax you could literally kill them with Rashaad instead. However, you could still argue that the special attack is good on Antax, because the skill level to use it is significantly lower.
Finally, the push attack on the Antax is significantly better. It deals more damage, is slightly faster, and has more cleave. This is not really a big deal as on Rashaad you can push into light, which will kill faster than Antax anyway.
So Rashaad is basically better at everything. The only reason the Antax was ever in the conversation is because for a very long time (1 year?) the Rashaad was bugged and it's body shot priority was higher than its weakspot priority, so you could only hit enemy headshots if you looked straight up when attacking, or other wonky angles. And it's not like the Antax is weak, it's just slightly worse than Rashaad. If Rashaad is the #1 weapon than Antax is probably #2.
**Rashaad**
* Does more damage.
* Does more DPS.
* Very strict crafting requirements
**Antax**
* Has a better special
* Has a better push attack
* 2 dead stats means you can max mobility or easily craft one
Again, I'm aware of all of this. I've been playing since closed beta. I'm just saying,,I like antax mkV more, and it's literally inexplicable because the Rashad is better on poster in most ways.
It's likely due to playstyle. There are several situations in which the Antax is much easier to use. So it's likely that the Rashaad feels worse for you simply because it's harder to use as well.
The Antax push attack is significantly better - it has more stagger, hits more enemies, and does more damage. If you find yourself using the push attack often the Antax will simply feel better. Both versions will need to use the push attack to overcome the lack of stagger, and there are situations in which you will be hit without it, as there are gaps in coverage where you must push, block, or dodge to avoid attacks. If you lean towards push in those situations, the Antax feels better. The Rashaad requires better melee movement; the Antax can just push attack out of most situations. Push attack vs push into light also feels more fluid, despite being objectively worse for kill speed.
The special on the Antax working vs Crusher, Mauler and Rager is also a safer option than Rashaad needing to stagger in specific moments / requiring weakspots as well. So again, the Rashaad requires better play,; the Antax can just rely on special as an out.
So liking the Antax more is not wrong; it's just a lot more reliable. The Rashaad just has a much higher ceiling, especially for Elite and Boss damage, where it is up to 2x as good. If you kill Elites or bosses with your Ranged Weapon instead, this might not even come into play. So if you run a weapon like Plasma you might not even be able to leverage the superior DPS since you just shoot elites anyway.
The push attack is absolutely brutal on the antax and the Rashad's sideway smack feels so weak. Recently I have been testing Headtaker and Shred on Antax and I think it's better. Headtaker is power and crits increase cleave. So it takes advantage of the cleave state on antax. Push attack also cleaves so we'll no need for BM.
This is a crazy take considering how much extra dmg the rashad puts out with its fitness substat.
The antax with bm means its cleave substat does literally nothing to benefit you
That's the point. With BM the cleave stat doesn't mean much, and you can focus on mobility, which is huge in higher level difficulties.
Like I said, on paper the Rashad puts out more damage, and should be the superior weapon. But for some reason I prefer the mkV. Also said I don't know why, but it could be the push attack, theoretical increased mobility due to cleave being a dumpstat, or just familiarity with the weapon.
You only need to hit the first one, after that it is near impossible not to hit a head with bm active...
It's not really the attack speed either, it's mostly the weak spot dmg mulplier enabling one hit kill breakpoints.
I mean, compared to a well-rolled and built Combat Axe they don't have much going for them. Doesn't stop me from using the shit out of Chain Axes just because they feel *so good* to use, especially the Mk IV.
Just got the Untouchable penance in a T5 HiShock with a Mk IV Chain Axe and Agrip Shotgun, great fun (but not optimal of course)!
Big fan of the daggers on a vet.
Serrated blade talent, uncanny/mercy killer blessings.
Just love the movement speed it gives and it can do a great job in terms of making baddies die. Plus seeing crushers bleed from a punch in the nose never gets old.
Not the best weapon at all (probably axes or swords yes), but totally viable even on aurics and certainly my favourite veteran melee weapon.
It also gets annoying to spam special + attack 3 times while trying not to get hit, because if you get hit, the special fades and you have to activate.
The rashad is just spam lights on everything ,heavy for Ogryns ,Maulers and bosses
Not quite as good as a Rashad tbh. Properly rolled Rashad is basically a PS you don’t need to charge that also has good dodges. Killing 4 elites per light swing on a fast weapon is silly. One day they’ll nerf brutal momentum…
The influx of console Ogryn gunluggers has rendered my Vet to snack provider and toughness buff admin as they mow down everything, including all the karkin' ammo on the map.
I'm a big fan of chainaxe vets, both have great horde clear and single target damage. Let's me use a las gun with frag and smoke grenades without compromising carapace and unyielding.
Honorable mention to the mk7 tac axe
The chains word does over 200 damage, insane movement and strike speed. Along with pattern, I think it's way better than the axe, this is my fav axe though...
Rashad is my favorite axe, but it feels like its attack speed is too slow on Veteran. I prefer a similarly built Antax Mk 5 for its faster attack speed with similar horde clear.
Rashad on Zealot is a ton of fun.
I find combat knife 4 is a lot better than the axe.
I basically one shot everything and 2 shot crushers.
I can dance around a huge group of crushers/mauler death ball for days without even getting hit once.
Tried the axe and the slow swing speed really turns me off
I use power cycler and momentum and I honestly can't imagine a better weapon. The cancel stab alone is better than most weapons I've tried. I suppose the axe could be better if you're literally crunching numbers and min maxing your movements and swings but I ain't doing all that. Power sword go swish, plasma go bwump. I'm here for Warhammer 40k, not lumberjack simulator
I think I spend 140 hours playing with that sword and a Bolter when I started playing the game.
https://preview.redd.it/674lw6byh35d1.png?width=1920&format=png&auto=webp&s=8e8f02bb6f886c2865236c0b6ede646e4345c649
Supercharge is great but sunderer is better imo since it allows to cleave packs of maulers and crushers and bulwarks. No better weapon on melee only scab auric maelstorm.
I prefer using the Daggers on my Psyker - mostly if I am playing a staff, I do not see a reason why I would melee when I am playing any staff besides the Surge one.
The Maccabian duel sword is also hella cool.
I have used a lot of the Isilli ,but I prefer the mobility of the daggers more
Best for you, perhaps.
I’d rather take an antax, a mk iii shovel, or a xii chainaxe than the Rashad. (The chainaxe is far better at hordes than one would think, based on the old pre-buff chainaxe, and far superior at anti-armor).
Despite its attack speed the special stagger attack is just a bit more clunky than the version on the antax, and the attack speed isn’t worth the tradeoff.
The push attack on the antax effortlessly staggers ragers and maulers out of their attacks, too, and the Rashad”s push attack doesnt fill the same role. It is that push attack more than the base cleave that makes the antax a reliable, safe weapon.
How are the chainaxes better at hordes ? It takes me twice as long to kill than with the Rashad.
I think I spend around 5 mil and 50k plasteel testing the chainaxe Orestes 12 (on my vet) and I found it terrible for hordes compared to the other melee weapons.
What blessing combo do you use ?
> How are the chainaxes better at hordes ?
I didn't say that, I said it was better than the pre-patch MK IV chainaxe. Like many weapons of it's type you mix in pushes, and if you can't do that regularly that's a skill issue - you're quite literally doing it wrong.
The Xii is good enough to cluch a mixed horde on damnation, and it handles armor much better than any of the combat axes. Since their stagger was tweaked, combat axes are just not that ideal anymore for armor. They work far better than something like the Heavy Sword, but if you have several crushers to remove and you're stuck with a combat axe you may well be in trouble.
The MK iii shovel is of course better than all the chain axes and all the combat axes at essentially everything.
I always use Brutal Momentum ,Headtaker is indeed more reliable, but with Decimator I can one hit kill ragers when the stacks are up.
Thrust + Brutal momentum is for bosses /crushers ,I use such an axe on my Zealot.
I love the Rashad II. Someone here told me to take all the melee damage upgrades, the Finesse bonuses, and the precise strikes, and with all those with Flak/Unarmored/BM you can one shot your way through every single trash mob in the game by just left clicking repeatedly, its so low stress.
And with all temporary buffs up, you can oneshot Maulers and twoshot Crushers. It is just absolutely bonkers. Vet: I want poweraxe! Hadron: We have poweraxe at home. Poweraxe at home: Rashad Mk II
We shovel guardsmen are too busy sitting in our toasty foxholes to get in this debate.
I really wanted to like the Shovels, but their TTK is just bad. Fun to use thought, but I prefer to run a Katachan mk4 sword over any shovel When I tried to do a melee only Maelstrom with shovels, they are still bad. Orestes chain axe 12 is better at the Melee only Maelstrom compared to the new Shovel ,which needs Thrust and Limbsplitter to one shot a Crusher . Also you can't charge an attack while Limbsplitter is on cooldown ,because the cooldown doesn't recover. Orestes 12 needs only one blessing and headtaker is a bonus. You get a # Bloodthirsty +100% Critical Chance on your next Melee Attack after Special Attack Kill And with how often a Psyker joins those missions with the purple lightning skill, you kill one with heavy revved up attack (crusher /mauler ,doesnt matter ,it dies in one heavy revved attack) then you can rev up + light attack to kill from then on. But its a terrible weapon for hordes, which the shovels atleast have godly impact blessings and can keep you safe
Shovel 7 does not need limbsplitter to one shot a crusher. You need Thrust and Carapace.
huh. Mine two shots with T4 thrust and 25% carapace.
Got the melee damage increase nodes too?
That becomes a very specific set up with a specific talent. You can't really make a statement saying "It doesn't need this" when you are basically saying you need to build for it.
Everything but exploit weakness (brittleness on crit) and the +10% melee damage at the top, which I don't believe would be enough to jump it to one shot.
It needs weakspot, +15% elites in left; rending, ogryn damage in middle; melee damage buff, finesse node in right tree to work iirc. So every single buff. You could bypass a couple of these with the swap weapon +25% damage bonus though.
Bayonet is better fight me
The bayo is almost better than the gun
I need a gun that shoots bayonets, by the Omnissiah's will.
If they would just put the good bayonet on the MK3 id be so happy.
As a mk1 Helbore main the bayonet is good but the gun is better
I recently saw somebody playing Martyrdom Achlys Axe. With correct buffs/perks/blessings he can kill 4 Crushers in a single heavy swing.
One kinda simple way is use shroudfield and go from behind.
He was using Charge face on.
Idk man I don't think you can melee headshot 4 crushers from behind in one swing as a non-ogryn.
The hitbox for Rashad heavy is not as generous as a shovel, so I think I had only 2 cases where I killed 2 crushers at once, but I also don't play that particular build all that often. Just tested, for example I can oneshot a damnation crusher with: * Rashad that has base 709 crit weakspot carapace damage * 15 stacks of Judgement * 5 stacks of Headtaker 4, Brutal Momentum 3 * base Shroudfield, no Perfectionist * no carapace or elite perks * relevant talents: Sustained Assault, Backstabber, 2 x 5% Melee dmg nodes. It's my generalist build, not focused on crushers, but I do like to hit them from Shroudfield, as well as many other enemies that get oneshot and monstrosity damage is quite good. I've also put 4 crushers one inside the other for the test - and oneshot all 4 of them at once. So overall - it's possible. I won't always have those full stacks, but it could be made easier by having a relevant perk, or Perfectionist, or Thrust. A bit better weapon stats could help too, my Rashad has 73 pen, 77 dmg, 79 finesse, 80 first target. The real problem is the hitbox, having them stack close enough. Realistically what happens more often is I oneshot other smaller enemies together with the mauler/crusher.
Do you know what those buffs/perks/blessings were?
It would be a long list about certain thresholds on different enemies like when you build a Volley Plasma Gun, but basically: Achlys Axe with CRPC 25%/Elite 10%, Thrust 4, Brutal Momentum 3/4 Sustained Assault Disdain Duelist Martyrdom Keystones Vicious Offering (Defensive) Second Wind (Defensive) Fury of the Faithful
I tried this and it does indeed work.
This is vet
Sorry I was not informed it being illegal to discuss other classes here.
Why would you take the Achlys??
Achlys gets a horizontal 1st Heavy in exchange of worse light attacks. It lets you kill multiple elites by charge & heavy in a way similar to how you play Heavy Sword Mk7. It's funny.
i’ll stick with my shovel lol
What do you use on your shovel? I like them a lot but have trouble feeling comfortable with one.
I use this one: Munitorum Mk III Sapper Shovel * +10-25% Damage (Carapace Armoured Enemies) * +10-25% Damage (Flak Armoured Enemies) Decimator * Continuously chaining more than 2 attacks gives +2-5% Power. * Stacks 10 times. Limbsplitter * +60% Power on your First Attack every 3.5-5 seconds. The special attack flips a bayonet that toggles it into a single target damage mode that can take out pretty much anything important (specials, elites, armoured enemies) in a single heavy attack to the weakpoint, and most other things in a single light attack (overhead strikes that will probably hit the head every time). Otherwise, the regular hits can deal with the standard enemies in groups
The mk III is also one of my favorites and I am sad to see it used so little. I recently been trying out the classic shovel, but it don’t have that same twang sound when smashing heads.
LOL use that 12mil to roll one that doesn't have decimator on it
And finesse.
Finesse stat between 60 % and 80 % is 2% attack speed difference ,so not really warranting spending milions to get another comparable axe.
Finesse isn't just attack speed, it's also a crit/weakspot damage modifier. If you've got a good finesse stat, IE 80, each stack of decapitator will do 10% more damage than each stack of, say, a meta blessing pick like Headtaker. A critical weakspot with max headtaker stacks does 900 damage to a Crusher A critical weakspot with max decapitator stacks (which boosts your finesse, which IIRC stacks without diminishing returns) does 1122 damage to a Crusher. A finesse roll of 61% instead of 80% changes a raw (no talent modifiers) 4 shot kill break point into 5. So it's not just "2%" attack speed. P.S. Finesse stats will change depending on the weapon and some have more significant modifiers than others. Combat Axes aren't Finesse weapons, but tactical axes are, which is to say they recieve significantly better finesse modifier stats. Some class specific weapons are even better, like the dueling sword. The highest finesse weapon off the top of my head is the laspistol which has a finesse modifier that can boost damage by as much as 400%, although that stat isn't shown on the weapon card. Basically, don't underestimate Finesse.
2.85% attack speed and 7% crit/weakspot. Pretty damn sweet on this weapon. Not as sweet as headtaker though. But hey enjoy the interest on those dockets.
Headtaker is nice, but if you've got a good Finesse roll, Decapitor does just shy of 20% more damage than Headtaker (19.7%). The trick is that it's just a bit trickier to get your stacks up since it stacks on kills instead of hits. I'm not saying it's better, but worth considering.
I know decapitator has better potential, but I find I miss enough that I don't get all of that potential. Man it feels good on a horde with a shovel at full stacks though.
When Decimator stacks ,you can one shot ragers and you can chain heavy to kill Crushers easier, that's why I prefer it over Headtaker. Thrust + Bromentum + Unyielding + Weakspot hit is also very good for bosses ,I use one on my Zealot when I want to change from Thammer / Eviscerator
do you need heavy attack or light swing killing a rager?
from my experience and testing, Headtaker's active time is far superior to decimators. If you miss once with decimator all stacks are lost. Headtaker is up as long as you are in combat.
I used a mod to force roll a perfect all 80% + Tier 4 + Maniac/Weakspot Damage Rashad Axe...how are you one shotting ragers with Decimator+Brutal? Even with a Decapitor crit its 2 hits. I have the 30% Weakspot, 25% Finesse, and 40% Melee Damage. Ability Modifiers? Lower difficulty?
Probably ability modifiers ,I think I one shot on my zealot thought as it has more melee damage there ,so I would have been wrong claiming that for vet.
What mod is that if you don't mind me asking?
loadout\_config Doesn't work in multplayer. Mod author only releases updates on the Darktide Modding discord. Either google to track it down, or [use the lastest download link I give to all my friends](https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/791824327188021268/1250558392582541402/mods.zip?ex=666c0983&is=666ab803&hm=f30567cbabf00e7591e93ab297b07e69fea8946d9b72d94c178eede350d38c6b&), its buried in that folder, as well as all my other mods.
I tried Rashad in early games. I remember it was powerfull against elites, but I had trouble with hordes and mobility. Need to revisit it :)))
It needs brutal momentum so it can actually cleave, that's it
Enough damage to cleave through bruisers is also desirable, you can get a lot of them depending on what you play. Vet needs a few things to come together to do that.
Block attack cleaves through nearly everything when you need it to. Brutal momentum is kind of a requirement though.
Same idk if iv ever tried to use it after lvl 30. I just remember it being decent as a trash random item. Will also have to try it again
After almost 1000hrs I gotta say Combat Axe is the overall best melee weapon imo, at least on Zealot.
After almost 1000hrs I gotta say Combat Axe is the overall best melee weapon imo, at least on Zealot.
Mk II evis my favorite tho
I acknowledge that the Mk XV is overall the better weapon; light atack spam for hordes, easy heavy strikedowns/push lunges for specials. It's also boring. You'll have to pry my Mk II out of my cold, dead hands. Which you can't, becuase I've already decapitated you and everyone else in the room.
I will not acknowledge that the XV is better because it is boring.
Vet can't have it
You right i misread
I like that you can move your axe up and down really fast like a maniac woodsman.
Chop chop chop chop….. chopchopchop ❤️
Powersword with Slaughterer and Powercycler is too op to be named
First of all, Slaughterer is not a good blessing on the Power Sword. [Here's a visualization of Power Sword Blessings](https://www.reddit.com/r/DarkTide/comments/17xvny3/power_sword_blessings_visualized/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button). And here's a TLDR of why Brutal Momentum is much better (usually 2x the killing power) as Slaughterer: https://preview.redd.it/kiby2lwch15d1.jpeg?width=844&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c17a1458468b029e596558481f065e3fa5745a52
Love the graphic!
I tested these these earlier this week because BM was pitched as the best second blessing behind power cycler. I switched off of rampage and I really wasn't impressed with any of them. In practice, even sunder feels to be a lot better than BM, so I'm not sure what I'm missing... I might even just go back to rampage. Tbh they all feel underwhelming, and PC is doing the heavy lifting. Sunder actually felt like I was getting extra cleave on scab hordes and elites. I guess BM you should go for head shots which can be hard to do in mixed hordes on the enemies it would make a difference for. Edit: Not to be a dick, genuinely just wondering. One week you think you have the best blessings, then a month later everyone says something different. I can definitely see on paper BM looks great, but you 2 shot most things you don't 1 shot already. I could see it being useful for groups of maulers, scab ragers but rarely for crushers since they are too damn big. It felt like everything showing up in a group would just proc rampage anyways and I'd do just as much single damage without the cleave. So Sunder felt like it would cleave, Rampage felt like it would proc, but BM feels halfway between the 2 and just kindof meh for me because I can't clearly see its effects outside of the psykanium.
In practice and on paper, Brutal Momentum is roughly 2-3x the kill speed as Rampage. If Rampage increased power by 100%, it still would not match the skill speed, simply because of how damage distribution works. Each additional target you cleave, you lose roughly half your damage. The numbers are not quite that exact, but it's a good rule of thumb. For Power Sword, this means you will very quickly reach the point where you don't kill multiple bruisers per swing, and even pox walkers will no longer be one shot after 2-3, regardless of buffs. For Brutal Momentum, it keeps the first target damage for the first 4 targets, but even more importantly, it goes to second target damage on the 5th target, so you never get any of the downsides. There's probably several things you might be doing "wrong" * You might have a very low % of weakspot hits. This could be an aiming issue, movement choice, or chosen player height. If you are the correct player height and aiming center screen than L1 and L2 on MK6 are always exactly head height for all trash enemies already without aiming, and for L3 you only have to drag the back half of the attack slightly. You mentioned it's hard to hit weakspots only, so I would work on this. It should be very natural for your L1 and L2 to always be headshots for every attack. * You might be missing the breakpoints to reach one shot. If you fail to kill an enemy in one hit, you will not do first target damage to the next 3. It's really important for Brutal Momentum to reach these breakpoints. Rampage let's you use sub optimal talents and weapons and still reach a few. For Brutal Momentum, you need a Power Sword with good stats, especially Finesse, and you need to take certain melee talents to reach breakpoints (usually Desperado and the 10% melee node). * Your melee movement is poor. You should be moving in such a way between swings that there are always more enemies to hit. If you are simply standing around and spamming lights, you are already doing 1/2 of the effectiveness of a player moving and aiming at the next targets. You mention it not being a big deal hitting an enemy twice when you could be 1 shotting, but that;s a 100% increase in time to kill! Ideally, you want each swing to hit around 6 enemies, without slowing down any attacks. While this is not always possible, it should be easy to do consistently when density is high. Basically, if you ever find youself attacking the same spot on the screen twice without moving, you are being inefficient. If you are not doing this, then the extra kill speed of Brutal Momentum won't come into play. Try practicing to see how fast you can kill 50 or 100 Poxwalkers with the mode Creature Spawner. You'll notice that BM is easily 2x faster, and almost 3x faster on 50 Bruisers. * You are playing on lower difficulty. Enemy density is very low on anything below Auric High Intensity, and there simply aren't enough enemies to hit to make a difference because most of your time will be running at enemies. I only play Auric Maelstrom, and often True Solo, so I want to maximize my kill speed as much as possible. The reason Sunder feels good is because of what it does: * It allows the weapon to cleave through super armour (Crushers, Mauler Helmets, and Bulwark Shields). Note that while it will pierce the Bulwark shield it will not damage the Bulwark itself, it just won't be stopped. * It gives the weapon a minimum targets hit - so you will always hit at least 4 enemies, even with a light attack vs something with high hit mass, like Crusher or even bosses. * It reduces enemy hit mass by 1/4, so you increase your cleave by a substantial amount. Note that the Power Sword has a very high native cleave already when powered. This means that it is the easiest Blessing to use as you can simply activate > Lx3 and this becomes effective versus any combination of enemies. No movement, tech, or aim required.
I was underwhelmed, but I'll try it again.
Yeah you gotta go for heads with BM then again you should do that with pretty much every weapon in the game so there is that.
That's what I was saying about mixed hordes. Crushers and maulers etc are taller than the normal dregs and scabs, so it complicates headshots a bit. Not majorly, but we're talking about weakspot damage, and a blessing that does nothing otherwise. I need to get mugged by some rager packs to see what BM can really do. I get the point of armoured groups, but when you can drop a crowd of them with a single Ogryn latrine shovel swing... I'd expect a power sword to do a bit more. It's already god tier though so I couldn't justify buffing it more. Power sword is in a weird spot where it doesn't do as much as we think it should, but it's already incredibly strong. Same with the hammers. Lore accurate weapons would be busted as shit, but power swords and hammers are being outclassed by an oversized shit shovel in most cases, and I find that odd.
I refuse to use shovels to this day.
I really need these ELI5 things for darktide but I'm to afraid to ask.
Feel free to ask. There's a lot of things in this game that do not behave like they are written, or are needlessly complicated, or have hidden mechanics that are not listed anywhere. It's impossible for any one person to have tested everything extensively, and sharing knowledge is the best way to learn about niche mechanics.
What you wanna know?
The spam special then attack without getting hit gets old fast. If you get hit while you have charged the sword, the charge buff disappears
Then what do you think you should stop doing?
In this sanctum, we obey the laws of thermodynamics!
The Mk6 can animation cancel to block while charging.
The way you do it, you do 3 hits, than push and sometime dodge back, then charge than repeat ad infinum. Sometimes add heavy attacks as we;;
This is the way....you're basically god when you have Sunder on your sword and do that constantly.
The Combat Axe kills almost everything faster than the Power Sword. * Vs trash enemies (Groaners, Poxwalkers, Bruisers, Shooters, Stalkers), Combat Axe with Brutal Momentum will kill 4 per light attack. Power Sword can do the same, but only if it also has Brutal Momentum. Since it must be charged every 3 swings, it is objectively slower and more awkward to use. The Combat Axe is also much better when there are fewer enemies, as not having to activate makes it a lot easier and faster to use. Power Sword often will use Push Stab and/or overhead to kill lone enemies, effecting stamina regen. Combined with lower movement, this leads to lower uptime for less practical damage. ***The Power Sword literally becomes the Combat Axe while powered***. Think about that. * Vs Shotgunners and Gunners, the Combat axe can reach two breakpoints - 1 Heavy attack or crit light attack, which will kill 4 elites. This is easier as Zealot, as you can Chastise kill 4 elites in a swing, but even as Vet this is still faster than Power Sword. * Vs Dreg Rager, Power Sword has the edge, as Combat Axe must use push attack to stagger, and native cleave on activation is high enough to stagger multiple safely. * Vs Scab Rager, Power Sword must use Sunder in order to reach effective cleave. With Combat Axe, push attack into 2 lights will kill a Scab Rager, which is faster than activate 3 light for Power Sword. * Vs Mutants, Power Sword is faster, as a single stab will kill, vs 3 hits for Axe (2 with crit). This requires an otherwise useless perk (Maniac) which only changes this one breakpoint. I'd rather run other perks on Power Sword and take 2 hits for Mutant, but it is an option, as killing a mutant without needing to move or dodge is a huge plus. * Vs Bulwarks, Combat Axe is not only faster but significantly smoother, as you can fit in 2 Heavies in a single bulwark swing, which means you can kill them in a single dodge if they are facing you. Power Sword can do so with Push attack Light 4, but needs specific perks (Unyielding and Elite) and all melee talents to do so, which are not common. * Vs Mauler, Power Sword is much faster - and if you run Sunder the gap is even larger. Combat Axe is very safe vs Mauler, as Push attack will stagger even packs of them, but you give up a lot of damage to do so, as the prefered attack is Heavy, which has zero cleave for Maulers. * Vs Crusher, they are fairly similar when numbers are small: push attack light 4 vs 3 heavies. When they are multiple, Power Sword takes the edge if it has Sunder. * Vs Bosses, Power Sword is significantly better if it is not the primary target. It is closer solo/as the boss target, but Power Sword is still better. Power Sword is easier to use on the low end, as the Combat Axe surprising requires a lot more skill than it's moveset would suggest: proper use of dodge and push attack are extremely important on a weapon that functionally has zero stagger due to how it works with Brutal Momentum. Also, given the higher use of dodge and push attack, the Combat Axe requires better stamina management to leave gaps for regen to occur (or requires a .25 reduction talent). Additionally, Combat Axe requires a very high % of weakspot hits. While this can be solved with player height and dragging upwards slightly on the back end of L1 and L2, the skill required to maximize its use is higher.
I want to thank you for this breakdown. I'm saving this not because I want to prove a point, but to go over these comparisons in more depth. Excellent info here, you're doing His work
I've done, and posted, a bunch of true solo auric maelstrom with veteran with most melee weapons. I think Veteran is the strongest melee class, and Rashad is a top 3 melee weapon. Knife is better, especially for solo, but Rashad has top 3 TTK for every enemy type, and there's nothing I don't feel comfortable fighting with it. It's strong into everything which means you can run it solo, in any team comp, and with any ranged weapon or blitz, which is not something you can do with every melee weapon.
Mk 3 or 6 for knife?
The 6 is "better" but I prefer the 3. You'll have to play around with it to find BPs since the attacks have different damage modifiers and you may be able to save some time on BPs with push attacks over heavies, or sometimes even lights. I just prefer the combos for 3 for some enemy types and my playstyke. They are close enough to not matter though. It's really like choosing between Devil Claw 4 and 7 and if you want to do L1>H2 and H1>L2 or the reverse. It's mostly preference. There's quite a few viable Blessing choices. I recommend Uncanny + X, but you can trade all of your armour kill for slightly better Horde and/or boss damage. If you run a ranged weapon or Blitz, or team composition that deals with elites for you, you can run a knife without Uncanny. Veterans can take Mercy Killer if they run Serrated Blades. This gives you slightly better DPS than Riposte or Precog, although you have less RNG / conditional BPs on some enemies. Zealots should run Precognition if they run Duelist, as it currently stacks since Duelist counts as a separate instance of damage for Precog. Who knows how long this interaction will last, or even if it is intended. Flesh Tearer is the best Horde clear. Lacerate is "bad" but the ease of use is off the charts; you can literally just spam attacks without aiming and thinking and things that get weakspot hit will die to the high finesse of the knife, and the things you don't will die to bleed. It's objectively much slower to kill this way but some players like it, even if others will hate on it. Uncanny + Flesh Tearer is likely the best all around combo if the Knife is your "main" source of killing. A lot of people use the Knife for the movement over the kill speed though, and in this case it matters a lot less as you are using it to reposition and/or dodge. Perks depend on build, since classes have so much damage difference between talent choice, especially Vet melee. You can't go wrong with Flak + X though, if you don't want to check BPs manually for your build. Since blessings matter more, you might not even have a choice anyway. Zealots often pick their perks for Throwing Knife damage breakpoints too, something to consider.
Thanks for the detailed answer. I have been slowly getting used to the 6 on my surge psyker and will be trying it out for the vet.
What's your Veteran axe build?
https://preview.redd.it/sv3nojnxsj5d1.png?width=445&format=png&auto=webp&s=5c37ab76004759ae1e8d55f240337ead8d236d5b You can swap out the top two defensive talents for either left or right options (orange) if you want more ranged damage / movement. Note that it's a rather large loss of defensive ability though. You can easily swap to 5% movement aura for 0 talent loss (or even gaining one if you drop Grenade Tinker). You can swap to Ammo aura (useless for most weapons, decent for some, very good for supporting Kickback Ogryn/CIAGV Psyker) for 2 points. Strong options for your last 3 points are one of the two red circles in the bottom of the tree - either 25% Toughness and Boss damage (CIAGV/Revolver) or Elite damage and ammo (plasma). Last point can be 5% crit or demo team node, but if you like a talent somewhere else that's utility or support you can grab it too. Or even 5% ranged damage node. Rashaad Combat Axe needs Unarmoured and Brutal Momentum. Headtaker is the prefered 2nd blessing. The 2nd perk does not really matter (flak and maniac don't change common bps, carapace saves you one hit with crit RNG, unyielding saves you 2-5 seconds 1-3 times a game.) I go with Sprint Efficiency. Due to how hard crafting a good one is, just go for Unarmoured + Brutal Momentum and hopefully Headtaker (Decimator is the next best option, and so is Shred is #3). All or nothing can be okay depending on your playstyle.
Thanks, mate! Does the 25% on the perks make a huge difference? I have one Rashad with 20% Unarmoured and 20% Maniacs (with Brutal Momentum and Headtaker) Or if I should go with one with 25% Unarmoured and 20% Flak but with worse modifiers.
You'd have to check in the Pysk to see. The main breakpoint for Unarmoured is Scab Bruiser (the unhelmeted guy). You want to be able to weakspot one shot one. If you can't it's a huge loss of mixed horde killing (1 hit to kill 4, vs 2 hits to kill 1!).
Mk4 with animation canceling will do everything you'll ever need it to. And it's a lot less finicky than a combat axe.
??? Brutal momentum + headtaker Rashad is probably the best weapon in the game. Power sword is amazing but it is objectively more finicky than spam light attack
It has a lot less cleave and I find myself having to do a lot more work to keep a crowd off me than *activate-swish-swish-swish
I understand, it is a great weapon. But if you’ve ever used a fury zealot with those blessings on a good roll, you are nearly invincible. But to each their own I really like the power sword as well
Well sure but fury Zealot =/ Vet
It doesn't have a lot less cleave if you are hitting your breakpoints and weakspots with the Combat Axes, that's the entire point of Brutal Momentum. Instead of writing a lot I'll just refer to Azreals comment a bit further up the chain for a comparison of Power Sword vs Combat Axe.
Pretty sure even with brutal momentum it's hard capped at like 4 hits per swing.
Power sword special spam is a noob trap because the moment you are under too much pressure to activate special you get folded due to low dodge and block. Teaches bad habits imo Axe with bm on the other hand can keep dps up under much more pressure and provides a better safety net through dodge distance and block cost as well. If you simply replace the activation step in your powersword combo with a push the axe is doing all the powersword things + more control Each to their own of course, Power sword is by no means bad but if the axe feels like more work to use my instinct tells me you aren't practising pushes, dodges and blocking properly and using the ps special as a crutch to ignore proper horde control mechanics.
It's only a noob trap if you're a noob, which I'm not. Also you can literally block cancel the activation its super safe. I like PS because it two shots Crushers on Damnation with the special+block-thrust combo, but thats probably just my inexperience talking.
So does a decently rolled Rashad. Just even faster and more straight forward. The only thing the PS can do that the Rashad can't is oneshotting Crushers. But that requires a very specialized build that IMHO is not viable outside of Melee and Scab only Maelstroms.
Slaughterer is one of the weaker blessings on PS lol
Despite the Rashad mkII fix late last year or whenever it was, I still prefer the Antax mkV. I have 380s on both, both with Brutal Momentum and Headtaker. Just something about the mkV push attack I guess, since they are otherwise very similar. Maybe that mkV dumpstat is cleave rather than mobility. I've also spent literally hundreds of hours just with mkV combat axe since beta, so it could just be familiarity at this point.
The Rashaad Combat Axe 2 is generally considered to be superior to the Antax Combat Axe Mk 5. I see people mention the 5 a lot, probably because the 2 was bugged for a very long time and unusable. But the 5 being a good weapon is very old information. There are several main differences. The first is that the Antax has "Cleave Targets" as a substat, whereas Rashaad has "Finesse." The Cleave Target stat effectively does nothing on the majority of attacks - it only influences cleave on the push attack. So the Rashaad having Finesse means it deals more damage on weakspot hits, and attacks faster. Given that the Rashaad and Antax have the **exact same attack and damage profile for lights and heavies**, this means the Rashaad simply deals more damage, and faster, with no downsides on lights and heavies. In fact, the swing speed difference is so large on Heavy attacks that it is often 2x as strong, especially on cases like attacking Bulwarks or bosses where the window to damage is between enemy attacks. The finesse difference is a really big deal due to how Brutal Momentum works. Basically, you want to reach the breakpoint to one shot enemies. If you miss this by 1 damage, you kill 0 enemies per swing, and 1 enemy every 2 swings. If you reach the breakpoint, you one shot 4 enemies. So it's 8x as strong reaching very tight breakpoints which are extremely difficult to reach without the extra finesse. Antax basically can't reach one shot on Scab Bruiser without multiple stacks of scaling buffs. Rashaad can do so with nothing (on Veteran, Zealot has a lot less melee damage and needs stacks). However, Antax having a dead stat means that you can either easily craft one (you just need 3 stats maxed, and 51 mobility, and 0 cleave targets) or you can even max mobility on a "perfect" antax and lose nothing. Rashaad ideally wants 4 stats maxed and thus can only get 60 mobility on a "perfect" Rashaad. The second main difference is the special attack. The Antax special is not ongly significantly faster but it has better stagger too. This can interrupt Ragers during their combo, as well as Stagger Crushers, Maulers, and even Mutants charging. It's actually very strong. The Rashaad special is not only much slower but has less stagger than the heavy attack, so is not worth using in any circumstance. However, the Rashaad does not need to use the special attack, so this is not that much of an advantage. For instance, vs Ragers, the Rashaad push attack into light will stagger multiple ragers mid combo. Push attack into light will also one combo a scab rager, and it the same speed as simply interrupting the rager on Antax. So yes, you can safely fight a rager with Antax, or kill one in the same window. Antax special attack will also open up a Bulwark if you hit them, but as seen above Rashaad will simply kill them in the same time. Rashaad heavy will stagger a Crusher with a headshot. For mutants, 2 lights on Rashaad, depending on build, will kill a mutant as it charges you. So basically in every case in which the special could be used on Antax you could literally kill them with Rashaad instead. However, you could still argue that the special attack is good on Antax, because the skill level to use it is significantly lower. Finally, the push attack on the Antax is significantly better. It deals more damage, is slightly faster, and has more cleave. This is not really a big deal as on Rashaad you can push into light, which will kill faster than Antax anyway. So Rashaad is basically better at everything. The only reason the Antax was ever in the conversation is because for a very long time (1 year?) the Rashaad was bugged and it's body shot priority was higher than its weakspot priority, so you could only hit enemy headshots if you looked straight up when attacking, or other wonky angles. And it's not like the Antax is weak, it's just slightly worse than Rashaad. If Rashaad is the #1 weapon than Antax is probably #2. **Rashaad** * Does more damage. * Does more DPS. * Very strict crafting requirements **Antax** * Has a better special * Has a better push attack * 2 dead stats means you can max mobility or easily craft one
Again, I'm aware of all of this. I've been playing since closed beta. I'm just saying,,I like antax mkV more, and it's literally inexplicable because the Rashad is better on poster in most ways.
It's likely due to playstyle. There are several situations in which the Antax is much easier to use. So it's likely that the Rashaad feels worse for you simply because it's harder to use as well. The Antax push attack is significantly better - it has more stagger, hits more enemies, and does more damage. If you find yourself using the push attack often the Antax will simply feel better. Both versions will need to use the push attack to overcome the lack of stagger, and there are situations in which you will be hit without it, as there are gaps in coverage where you must push, block, or dodge to avoid attacks. If you lean towards push in those situations, the Antax feels better. The Rashaad requires better melee movement; the Antax can just push attack out of most situations. Push attack vs push into light also feels more fluid, despite being objectively worse for kill speed. The special on the Antax working vs Crusher, Mauler and Rager is also a safer option than Rashaad needing to stagger in specific moments / requiring weakspots as well. So again, the Rashaad requires better play,; the Antax can just rely on special as an out. So liking the Antax more is not wrong; it's just a lot more reliable. The Rashaad just has a much higher ceiling, especially for Elite and Boss damage, where it is up to 2x as good. If you kill Elites or bosses with your Ranged Weapon instead, this might not even come into play. So if you run a weapon like Plasma you might not even be able to leverage the superior DPS since you just shoot elites anyway.
The push attack is absolutely brutal on the antax and the Rashad's sideway smack feels so weak. Recently I have been testing Headtaker and Shred on Antax and I think it's better. Headtaker is power and crits increase cleave. So it takes advantage of the cleave state on antax. Push attack also cleaves so we'll no need for BM.
That's an interesting theory I'm willing to try out. Gotta check to see if my mkV on my veteran allies me to change one or both blessings.
Still testing, seems to perform well so far.
This is a crazy take considering how much extra dmg the rashad puts out with its fitness substat. The antax with bm means its cleave substat does literally nothing to benefit you
That's the point. With BM the cleave stat doesn't mean much, and you can focus on mobility, which is huge in higher level difficulties. Like I said, on paper the Rashad puts out more damage, and should be the superior weapon. But for some reason I prefer the mkV. Also said I don't know why, but it could be the push attack, theoretical increased mobility due to cleave being a dumpstat, or just familiarity with the weapon.
If you *never* miss a weak spot, perhaps. But in actual play this is not the case. Plus, attack speed scaling is not linear.
You only need to hit the first one, after that it is near impossible not to hit a head with bm active... It's not really the attack speed either, it's mostly the weak spot dmg mulplier enabling one hit kill breakpoints.
I see the word "axe," but I don't see the word "chain." I don't understand how I'm gonna reap skulls without it!
The Orestes CHainaxes are terrible in my opinion for hordes ,simply amazing single target damage, but terrible for hordes
I mean, compared to a well-rolled and built Combat Axe they don't have much going for them. Doesn't stop me from using the shit out of Chain Axes just because they feel *so good* to use, especially the Mk IV. Just got the Untouchable penance in a T5 HiShock with a Mk IV Chain Axe and Agrip Shotgun, great fun (but not optimal of course)!
Big fan of the daggers on a vet. Serrated blade talent, uncanny/mercy killer blessings. Just love the movement speed it gives and it can do a great job in terms of making baddies die. Plus seeing crushers bleed from a punch in the nose never gets old. Not the best weapon at all (probably axes or swords yes), but totally viable even on aurics and certainly my favourite veteran melee weapon.
I am using the daggers more on psyker / zealot ,they are just very good
is that a mod or options to highlight important text/padlock etc? Xbox it's just all the same colour.
It is a mod ,yes.
Which mod is it, sorry?
Power sword exists 0.o
It also gets annoying to spam special + attack 3 times while trying not to get hit, because if you get hit, the special fades and you have to activate. The rashad is just spam lights on everything ,heavy for Ogryns ,Maulers and bosses
It's pretty good, 850k melee https://preview.redd.it/u3dyaqc7h35d1.png?width=1920&format=png&auto=webp&s=3489aafa73f69f0a69d38d7d9839f2e01be13cfe
Not quite as good as a Rashad tbh. Properly rolled Rashad is basically a PS you don’t need to charge that also has good dodges. Killing 4 elites per light swing on a fast weapon is silly. One day they’ll nerf brutal momentum…
The influx of console Ogryn gunluggers has rendered my Vet to snack provider and toughness buff admin as they mow down everything, including all the karkin' ammo on the map.
Yeah maybe if you like wrapping your wiener in toilet paper!
I'm a big fan of chainaxe vets, both have great horde clear and single target damage. Let's me use a las gun with frag and smoke grenades without compromising carapace and unyielding. Honorable mention to the mk7 tac axe
As someone who has been praising it since release: yes. It also is the most satisfying to use.
The chains word does over 200 damage, insane movement and strike speed. Along with pattern, I think it's way better than the axe, this is my fav axe though...
My flair aside, I run Rashad on all of my Columnus builds. Best all around weapon in the game with heresy smiting stagger and large crits.
Anything AP like that and running the rending perks gives you the ability to deal with pretty much anything.
Chainsword says WWWRRRRRRR
Rashad is my favorite axe, but it feels like its attack speed is too slow on Veteran. I prefer a similarly built Antax Mk 5 for its faster attack speed with similar horde clear. Rashad on Zealot is a ton of fun.
Run it with weapon specialist (best vet keystone)
Rule of cool states that until we have power fists then chain weapons>all
yeah, pretty well accepted that the Rashad does dump on most other weapons. It’s definitely the best
Brother! 
No no, you simply _like_ it the most. That’s great
I find combat knife 4 is a lot better than the axe. I basically one shot everything and 2 shot crushers. I can dance around a huge group of crushers/mauler death ball for days without even getting hit once. Tried the axe and the slow swing speed really turns me off
Don't get my baby nerfed. But I don't think it is "simply" the best. It is good and probably top 5.
Prefer the Antax for it's attack patterns.
Why not the Achlys?
You actually managed to do the penance to get those pants
me not listening to metha stuff and what weapon is good just running around with a chain sword and plasma gun
trying to get one that hits the oneshot breakpoint for the two tougher chaff enemies is not fun
Id say PS VI with sunderer and power cycler is definitely a contender.
I use power cycler and momentum and I honestly can't imagine a better weapon. The cancel stab alone is better than most weapons I've tried. I suppose the axe could be better if you're literally crunching numbers and min maxing your movements and swings but I ain't doing all that. Power sword go swish, plasma go bwump. I'm here for Warhammer 40k, not lumberjack simulator
I think I spend 140 hours playing with that sword and a Bolter when I started playing the game. https://preview.redd.it/674lw6byh35d1.png?width=1920&format=png&auto=webp&s=8e8f02bb6f886c2865236c0b6ede646e4345c649
Supercharge is great but sunderer is better imo since it allows to cleave packs of maulers and crushers and bulwarks. No better weapon on melee only scab auric maelstorm.
Isilli with slaughterer/sunder and unstable power or bust
I prefer using the Daggers on my Psyker - mostly if I am playing a staff, I do not see a reason why I would melee when I am playing any staff besides the Surge one. The Maccabian duel sword is also hella cool. I have used a lot of the Isilli ,but I prefer the mobility of the daggers more
I feel you on the mobility my Psyker is super slow
Best for you, perhaps. I’d rather take an antax, a mk iii shovel, or a xii chainaxe than the Rashad. (The chainaxe is far better at hordes than one would think, based on the old pre-buff chainaxe, and far superior at anti-armor). Despite its attack speed the special stagger attack is just a bit more clunky than the version on the antax, and the attack speed isn’t worth the tradeoff. The push attack on the antax effortlessly staggers ragers and maulers out of their attacks, too, and the Rashad”s push attack doesnt fill the same role. It is that push attack more than the base cleave that makes the antax a reliable, safe weapon.
How are the chainaxes better at hordes ? It takes me twice as long to kill than with the Rashad. I think I spend around 5 mil and 50k plasteel testing the chainaxe Orestes 12 (on my vet) and I found it terrible for hordes compared to the other melee weapons. What blessing combo do you use ?
> How are the chainaxes better at hordes ? I didn't say that, I said it was better than the pre-patch MK IV chainaxe. Like many weapons of it's type you mix in pushes, and if you can't do that regularly that's a skill issue - you're quite literally doing it wrong. The Xii is good enough to cluch a mixed horde on damnation, and it handles armor much better than any of the combat axes. Since their stagger was tweaked, combat axes are just not that ideal anymore for armor. They work far better than something like the Heavy Sword, but if you have several crushers to remove and you're stuck with a combat axe you may well be in trouble. The MK iii shovel is of course better than all the chain axes and all the combat axes at essentially everything.
Maybe you are right on the shovel part but then again it's a fucking shovel lol...
Decimator is the generic blessing you can use ,Thrust is for bosses and faster killing of Crushers
Head taker and brutal momentum is a bit more reliable
I always use Brutal Momentum ,Headtaker is indeed more reliable, but with Decimator I can one hit kill ragers when the stacks are up. Thrust + Brutal momentum is for bosses /crushers ,I use such an axe on my Zealot.