Tactical Axe

[Grumpy Giuseppe]

Hey guys,

I recently started playing Darktide up to lv 20 as zealot now.
I tried all weapons and found the tac axe to be the most fun.

With no doubt the mark vii was the most powerful because the bash attack => short heavy attack combo is insane for horde.
The only downside is that this combo doesn't scale well with attack speed.

Now I looked into a dodge build without bashing.
With the mark vii the best combo for horde i found was SA => LA => short HA => block cancel (into SA) SA => short HA => block cancel (into SA).
This combo is like 40% faster than the bash combo and also doesn't scale well with attack speed.

I think that maybe the mark iv is the better choice here because you can just chain LAs and maybe some SAs and also profit from attack speed.

What do you think?

[Zsrai]

I think Mark II is the most common choice, but I don't use Tac Axes a whole lot. Most of them are just Light spam though, from what I remember.

[JuX]

The true potential of zealots tactical axe is the 100% critical hit chance blessing, so you will be reducing your ability cooldown constantly and can take agile so you can dance forever and get 10% weakspot damage.

[FavoriteZero16]

tacaxe is a beast on vet due to bleed stacks on demand 10% rending brittleness on hit and crit along side elite 15% and ogryn and monstrosities 20% make for a nice 35% boost to crushers

thats not even mentioning the stamina regen rate is amazing

tacaxes get slept on too much they have some of the best reliability in a melee

[Arani]

I'm no expert on TacAxes but that still prolly means more experience than most. Still, take all this with a grain of salt.

Iirc the "official" TacAxe VII's horde & cleave combos are H > L or PA > H, repeat. So typically you'd start with PA > H > L, then repeat H > L to get that speed & CC & power from the initial PA and then ease into the base combo.

For single targets it's supposed to be L spam, but that I don't agree with. For example I love doing PA > L > S > L > L. It's really fast, has good stagger & DPS & headshots throughout, and the string is long enough to recover the stamina spent on PA. Ofc don't forget weaving in heavies when you initiate, dodge, or for picking out key targets in a crowd.

I honeslty don't yet have a 100% hang of this weapon but I'm a big fan of its extremely robust moveset. It combines fantastic cleaves, speed & strong single target attacks into one with a very high variability, so you're constantly adapting as the situation requires.

I also feel like VII is far less dependant on blessings like Agile or BM compared to the other TAxes. The PA & H at head height is so strong you'll do fine even without BM, and between the cleave & stagger from constant PA's & specials, you're not likely to run out of dodges either. Which lets you relatively safely pick Shred & Headtaker for instance as generalist buffs that help you no matter what's going on, instead of specific limited situations only.

[JuX]

Originally posted by FavoriteZero16:

tacaxe is a beast on vet due to bleed stacks on demand 10% rending brittleness o hit and crit along side elite 15% and ogryn and monstrosities 20% make for a nice 35% boost to crushers

thats not even mentioning the stamina regen rate is amazing

tacaxes get slept on too much they have some of the best reliability in a melee

I find the exploit weakness talent to be rather underwhelming. It only applies brittle on melee critical hits, which is more inconsistent and redundant attribute for a veteran.

Simply put you can stack so much damage on veteran that you outright kill crushers before even applying a stack of brittle.

[varicose 'vascular' vinny]

it's a pretty good weapon. it has strong crits, more than average crit rate and all the humans have crit loadouts. it hits fast and doesn't fall off too hard until carapace. I think the main reason you don't see it is that it sits in the same stamina category as knife and dueling without their crazy high mobility and for some reason far reaching attacks. it just has a good dodge and high crit multiplier like them.

[Jez]

i just time the charges according to the situation i mean i din't go for combos, but i like the Short Attack to Medium Attack combo you mention, it's like 1 side swing and then 1 over head swing, effective :)

[Grumpy Giuseppe]

Originally posted by Arani:

I'm no expert on TacAxes but that still prolly means more experience than most. Still, take all this with a grain of salt.

Iirc the "official" TacAxe VII's horde & cleave combos are H > L or PA > H, repeat. So typically you'd start with PA > H > L, then repeat H > L to get that speed & CC & power from the initial PA and then ease into the base combo.

For single targets it's supposed to be L spam, but that I don't agree with. For example I love doing PA > L > S > L > L. It's really fast, has good stagger & DPS & headshots throughout, and the string is long enough to recover the stamina spent on PA. Ofc don't forget weaving in heavies when you initiate, dodge, or for picking out key targets in a crowd.

I honeslty don't yet have a 100% hang of this weapon but I'm a big fan of its extremely robust moveset. It combines fantastic cleaves, speed & strong single target attacks into one with a very high variability, so you're constantly adapting as the situation requires.

I also feel like VII is far less dependant on blessings like Agile or BM compared to the other TAxes. The PA & H at head height is so strong you'll do fine even without BM, and between the cleave & stagger from constant PA's & specials, you're not likely to run out of dodges either. Which lets you relatively safely pick Shred & Headtaker for instance as generalist buffs that help you no matter what's going on, instead of specific limited situations only.

I think you are right with that combos.
I only dislike to do any attack after a HA because it is much faster to block cancel the HA.
I also like the 'vicious offering' talent so for the vii I may even settle for a combination of PA => HA and SA => HA => block into SA, depending on stamina.

[Vacenti]

TacAxe IV can already cleave 2-3 enemies per light attack with headtaker/decimator anyways. You dont really have to rely on heavy attacks imo. Ive gotten out of mixed hordes with crushers, ragers, maulers, and an army of poxwalkers by spamming crit weak spot light attacks over and over with occasional push attacks.

The mk Iv LA feels faster to, so you can still effectively delete hordes

[xDaunt]

The MkIV is a light attack spam monster. The advantage that the VII has over it is the diagonal strikedown H1 that lets you better leverage brutal momentum. However, I'm not entirely sold on the idea that tactical axes really benefit from brutal momentum. Slaughter spree, on the other hand, seems like a mandatory pick at this point.

[Hex]

It was made obsolete when Vet got access to Dueling Sword. Has much better mobility and 2shots crushers. Fatshark never bothered to actually test it on vet, it's pretty obvious as it makes several weapons pointless.

If you want to try a really strong yet completely overlooked weapon on Vet, use the Devil's Calw. The counter oneshots ragers, making it the perfect weapon for when you get pressured. Also good against hordes, unlike dueling sword.

[Ire]

Originally posted by Hex:

It was made obsolete when Vet got access to Dueling Sword. Has much better mobility and 2shots crushers. Fatshark never bothered to actually test it on vet, it's pretty obvious as it makes several weapons pointless.

If you want to try a really strong yet completely overlooked weapon on Vet, use the Devil's Calw. The counter oneshots ragers, making it the perfect weapon for when you get pressured. Also good against hordes, unlike dueling sword.

+1 for devil swords. I have a build for them on each class, its a lot of fun. Not just good against hordes, I think its perhaps the best horde clear weapon there is.

[Pie Eater]

Just tried tac axe after dismissing it since launch. and it seems neat....but with access to dueling sword It just feels outclassed in all metrics it seems it's supposed to fill.

[Hex]

Originally posted by Pie Eater:

Just tried tac axe after dismissing it since launch. and it seems neat....but with access to dueling sword It just feels outclassed in all metrics it seems it's supposed to fill.

Yeah, they just gave the DS to vet and zealot with 0 testing. Used to be psyker only weapon.

Psyker doesn't get the incredibly strong weakspot and rending bonuses Vet does, so the weapon becomes way too strong in Vet hands. On Zealot it's kinda meh, I still prefer Evi.

[Arani]

Originally posted by Pie Eater:

Just tried tac axe after dismissing it since launch. and it seems neat....but with access to dueling sword It just feels outclassed in all metrics it seems it's supposed to fill.

I want to disagree but honestly not sure how. I'd love for someone more knowledgeable than me to have some input on this. @DLCI? xD Imo TAxes are perfectly viable and I use them way more often than Duelling Swords, but that's just me being a snowflake and avoiding meta for its own sake. Plus at least DSIV is crazy boring.

DS's have basically all of the same perks & benefits as TAxes: Mobility, sprint efficiency, Agile... but they also come with a better reach, more single target & anti-armor DPS, and a way simpler moveset so much easier to use. Even that cleave that's supposed to be their weakness isn't bad at all: DSIV light spam basically always gets headshots, between that, the crits, their finesse dmg and Rampage on top, they're more than good enough for hordes. They have hecking fast attacks too.

Far as I can tell, the only notable advantages for TacAxes are the +12% base crit and quickly mixing in single-target attacks mid-combo, without relying on that heavy wind-up of DS's. Neither of these are so difficult as to be hard to play around.