What are your thoughts on Cleavers?

[HoroSaga]

What are your opinions on cleavers? I haven't experimented with them much, since I'm generally discouraged by their extremely low armor penetration.

Bleeding seems like it could be situationally useful against goblins and humans, but it seems like it would be relatively useless against orcs, and (of course) completely useless against undead.

[Brah]

I gave a named orc cleaver to an iron lunged brother. He was a butcher with it. The military cleaver is useful against unamoured opponents or orcs who have had their armour broken. Swords and spears are a lot more useful against gobbos then the cleaver as the aren't very tough.

[Whatever100500]

I I remember stats right:
Khopesh cleaver has 35-55 dmg 25% penetration 120% armor damage.
Fighting Axe has 35-55 dmg 30% penetration 130% armor damage.
So base stats are not too bad and attack fatigue cost is same for base attack.

I'm not sure named Khopeshs exist though, which is a big problem if they don't.

Ideal target for cleaver can bleed, is easy to hit (since cleaver has no hit bonus), has no-to-moderate armor (need penetrate with some damage on every hit to apply bleeding), has a lot of hp, and doesn't hit too often and/or hard (otherwise you need to kill it fast, wasting bleeding effect). Does this sound like something you need to specialize against? To me it doesn't.

[HoroSaga]

I remember seeing a few people mention that there was a "Decapitate" special attack on some cleavers. I don't remember seeing it the last time I had one equipped, but perhaps I had the wrong weapon equipped (or perhaps the special hadn't been added yet at that point in development).

How does it work?

[FieserMoep]

Not a great fan of cleavers. Mostly I seem to specialize in weapons that have decent capabilities to deal with armor and cleavers are not on my screen in that regard.

[Brah]

Treat bleeding damage as bonus damage, don't expect enemies to bleed to death. Enemies who are slowly bleeding to death are still a threat.

Originally posted by HoroSaga:

I remember seeing a few people mention that there was a "Decapitate" special attack on some cleavers. I don't remember seeing it the last time I had one equipped, but perhaps I had the wrong weapon equipped (or perhaps the special hadn't been added yet at that point in development).

How does it work?

Decapitate does more damage the less health the target has. The target is beheaded if the attack is fatal.

[Sathra]

Khopesh are fairly good against most things. Decapitate is only useful against wierdergangers, but due to how it works, it can also wreck armour.
The actual big downside of the Khopesh is the low durability. Nearly broken them a few times.
Overall, cleavers are fun but not something to use against really heavily armoured opponents (over 200 armour). Also, huge stamina drain.

[titanopteryx]

Leave it to cleaver.

[h0b0king]

All I know is I hate fallen heroes with cleavers - since fighting the undead is all about fatigur and and resistance, losing damge over time is the worst in these fights. I bring bandages on my frontliners now. Just against undead though, and yeah, despite being fond of the cleaver idea (and decapitate) I don't use them much.

[Kakuna Rattata]

Everything cleavers can do, axes do better. Especially if you get the crippling strikes perk with an axeman. Then you have a decent chance to apply cut artery or another bleed effect. I personally don't like bleed effects that much, since I tend to like bursts of damage on specific targets. Also, I don't think you get the kill if the bleed damage gets them. It just says they "died."

[Zorp]

The khopesh and crypt cleaver are some of the best weapons in the game (Especially the crypt cleaver) imo, it has great armour damage and can straight up ignore armour to finish wounded opponents off with decapitate. (and it looks cool af)

The 10 damage bleed with cleaver mastery is also nothing to sneeze at, it can stack and bleeding orc warlords to death is surprisingly effective

[Chicago Ted]

They're good weapons for the cleanup crew since beheading an enemy has a bigger impact to morale than just killing them.

[mrbunnyban]

Teamwork is key. Keep a brother with a hammer nearby.

Edit: I did try to build a Duelist perk brother whose damage will penetrate armor and thus always bleed. But I'm having issues keeping the brother safe though, was trying to use nimble and dodge to make up for lack of shield but cleavers are SUPER HEAVY. @.@

[sikker]

Originally posted by Feluto:

The khopesh and crypt cleaver are some of the best weapons in the game (Especially the crypt cleaver) imo, it has great armour damage and can straight up ignore armour to finish wounded opponents off with decapitate. (and it looks cool af)

The 10 damage bleed with cleaver mastery is also nothing to sneeze at, it can stack and bleeding orc warlords to death is surprisingly effective

The crypt cleaver armor damage was nerfed, it's not that good anymore.

[McGrits]

I wish the cleaver had a better special attack. The fact it is based on previous damage is counter to how this game works. To get to where decapitate is effective, you have already spent your fatigue on hurting the eneemy, leaving you no fatigue left to use the skill. I would prefer that the skill would give a weapon based crippling strikes style perk. This would let it be used at the onset of a fight and give the weapon more tactical capability and a value on par other weapons types. Of course, this would make orcs even more dangerous since they could cripple your unit more often, but hey, they are orcs.

Also, undead need injuries just like all other units. A zombie or skeleton missing a hand or limb is less effective than a full up unit.

[Sendos]

Cleaves are a bit of an odd weapon. The bleed is nice but it's usually unnecessary against goblins and they are usually not effective against armour. Occasionally I get bleed kills with them. The khopesh is preferable because of its extra armour damage.

The decapitate skill is both very situational and underwhelming. It's mainly good against zombies but I don't much value to the skill. I reckon it should be buffed so that it provides an additional morale check for surrounding enemies. What would be more scary than seeing your comrade die in the most horrific manner possible?