Thunder Hammer SUCKS

[Ragvard Grimclaw]

So, I've decided to try an assault class, despite all the warnings in discussions. It can't be that bad, right?

It can, it so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ can. Thunder hammer, signature weapon of the assault class, is probably the worst melee weapon in the game (haven't tried powerfist yet). And the reason is not its slowness, not lack of damage (albeit it really should hit harder and penetrate shields with any attack), but the fact that it can't regain contested health.
Well, it techincally can, but laughably tiny amount. You can stand in the sea of gaunts, turn half a dozen of them into red mist with each swing, but you'll still recover only a single tiny bit of health from it. It doesn't matter how many enemies you've hit, only one will count in contested heath regen. Where melta would've overhealed you from 0 to max, thunder hammer will barely get you half a segment, with the same number of enemies killed.

And I'm also quite sure that game doesn't care about damage dealt - haven't tested it, but I bet that by killing a gaunt with a pistol you'll regan more health than by killing it with a single hit of a hammer. At the very least, I have better luck regaining health with a knife than with a hammer that kills multiple enemies with each swing.

Fix this ♥♥♥♥. I assume all melee weapons have this issue, but it's most noticeable on thunder hammer, with its crowd-focused moveset. Also make it interrup everything smaller than hellbrute or carnifex with any hit, currently, any warrior or rubric can power through the swing like you're using a pool noodle instead of a literal anti-tank weapon.

[Ragvard Grimclaw]

Originally posted by Kai_27-:

EDIT for your edit: agreed on the weakness to ranged attacks, its why I said that versus tyranids specifically I like assualt, they're really, really bad versus chaos at the minute with the abundance of ranged attacks / chaos marines

Well I have no issues with assault being weak against ranged enemies... as long as it's strong in melee without cheesing it with fencing parry spam (which any class can do)

[Kai_27-]

Originally posted by Ragvard Grimclaw:

Originally posted by Kai_27-:

EDIT for your edit: agreed on the weakness to ranged attacks, its why I said that versus tyranids specifically I like assualt, they're really, really bad versus chaos at the minute with the abundance of ranged attacks / chaos marines

Well I have no issues with assault being weak against ranged enemies... as long as it's strong in melee without cheesing it with fencing parry spam (which any class can do)

Thats what I mean - it IS strong versus melee, but only once you get the perk at level 23ish that restores the cooldown on your slam by 10% per kill you get with the slam, its very easy to chain 5 or more slams on objectives where things have to climb up to you, plus the 50% damage boost on gunstrikes makes assualt quite potent in melee if you get parries on majoris enemies

Though obviously, this is nothing to do with the thunderhammer specifically, and more the class as a whole so not really the topic of the thread

[Miles LongDong]

People keep focusing on parries. The class literally gets a +50% perfect dodge window. You should be practicing nailing perfect dodges consistently especially with jump pack dash so that when you hit 25 you can rip apart hordes not just with the hammer but with the class. Chaos is great because they give you heaps of red attacks to dodge especially the fire guys and the ranged guys die in 1 hit with the heavy pistol with the +1 penetrate you can clear them very easily.

[Oro]

Originally posted by Miles LongDong:

People keep focusing on parries. The class literally gets a +50% perfect dodge window. You should be practicing nailing perfect dodges consistently especially with jump pack dash so that when you hit 25 you can rip apart hordes not just with the hammer but with the class. Chaos is great because they give you heaps of red attacks to dodge especially the fire guys and the ranged guys die in 1 hit with the heavy pistol with the +1 penetrate you can clear them very easily.

Because you can't perfect dodge regular minoris attacks, which is where all the damage comes from.

[Doomsday10tac2]

Originally posted by Ragvard Grimclaw:

Originally posted by Miles LongDong:

I dont think it sucks. I do pretty well with it. You just cant swing it very often in ruthless because you have to dodge and parry so much to clear minoris when you're surrounded and for gun strikes.

That's the whole issue. This is anti-crowd weapon, whole purpose of which is to wipe minoris out, but you can't really use it in the crowd. Sure, you can jump in and delete the crowd in seconds, but you'll do it like 3 times and you have no health, because despite you fully killing like 30 enemies each time, game only registered 5 hits and gave you half a segment of health back

Spot on

[Doomsday10tac2]

Originally posted by Oro:

Originally posted by Miles LongDong:

People keep focusing on parries. The class literally gets a +50% perfect dodge window. You should be practicing nailing perfect dodges consistently especially with jump pack dash so that when you hit 25 you can rip apart hordes not just with the hammer but with the class. Chaos is great because they give you heaps of red attacks to dodge especially the fire guys and the ranged guys die in 1 hit with the heavy pistol with the +1 penetrate you can clear them very easily.

Because you can't perfect dodge regular minoris attacks, which is where all the damage comes from.

Boom^

[Alex]

Ignore the troll posts. Even on the official website they say assault class is bugged. Working on a fix.

[BigJ]

Wait till you see the state of the power fist lmao, atleast thunder hammer staggers minoris

[M4N]

"Skill issue" clowns. Some things just never changes.

[Moffin Bovin]

Originally posted by Ragvard Grimclaw:

It goes against of what game tells player to do. In tutorial, game tells me that I need to kill enemies to regan health. So, I go, kill 30 enemies while parrying every blue and dodging every red attack... and I end up with less health that I started because, somehow, killing 5 enemies per second is not enough to offset chip damage from the crowd. But if I try the same with, say, a knife, I'll lose much less health due to more quick attacks, despite it taking me a minute to kill everything

Tbh the whole contested hp system is mostly worthless. Usually you get hit by something big that takes off 70% of your hp and staggers you and then the contested hp has drained away before you have a chance to do anything about it.

It may as well not even be in the game.

[Moffin Bovin]

Originally posted by Miles LongDong:

Chaos is great because they give you heaps of red attacks to dodge especially the fire guys and the ranged guys die in 1 hit with the heavy pistol with the +1 penetrate you can clear them very easily.

except if you are doing any melee attack when one of those "red attacks" comes up you are animation locked and unable to dodge.

The assault sucks because you are punished for using your melee weapon and all they have is a pistol.

[Bolodenka1902[Tönt]]

It does suck, but it's obviously not the biggest issue.
In a game where any attack can kill you in <1s melee just isn't viable without some cheese. DT/VT uses queue systems and i-frames along with snappy melee to make it possible, but SM2 doesn't really give you the tools.
There's a reason why Sniper, Heavy and Tactical are far and above the best classes atm.

[Bolodenka1902[Tönt]]

Originally posted by FromChaosTheory:

I love thunder hammer. What you mean. I rip anything I touch to shreds.

Nah, you dont. It does less dps than chainsword.

[DA2Z]

Sadly far too many butt kisser will just scream it’s a skill issue and defend this game too death

[Whitto]

I barely comment on steam because I'm on ps5 these days, but I had to comment just to tell you that you are 100% correct and anyone who disagrees is either in denial, lying, or just playing lower difficulty.

I have used the thunder hammer for ages now and Im actually decent with it, but I will happily admit it is ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ terrible. It does not feel like a powerful weapon to use AT ALL and as you said, the way you would expect to use this weapon is not effective i.e swinging through big crowds. Chaos marines just stand there and don't even flinch, ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ ridiculous.

I actually think the devs got lazy with the hammer. Like, the artificer/relic variants of the other weapons look so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ cool and are all different. The thunderhammer however, has the EXACT SAME 3 designs for the artificer and relic. The fact it also deals less damage then a chainsword? Like what the hell. To me it is is clear that the devs didn't think this weapon through at all, or even playtest it.