Will you equip your brother with great axe?

[ioci]

I found the great axe the least used weapon in my rank. In early game this type of weapon serves fine: it breaks shield in 1 hit and can start to break the enemy line the next turn, but once I get proper polearm and greatsword, this weapon just no longer shine.

Greatsword is better than great axe in all case, it does not do that much friendly hit so you can place a polearm guy behind, and it builds up less fatigue so you can swing it more often before taking a breath. For armour breaking, it would be the great hammer to do the job, and for shield breaking, long axe and one hand axe are doing fine too, plus these two alternative choices of axe offer more survivability to my brothers as well.

I figure that this weapon was supposed to be the flank protection role, but to train a tower guy using great axe is difficult, it needs super high stamina, super high melee skill, high hip point, high defence, and super high moral, otherwise the brother with this weapon will eventually end up like a 1 hex long axe guy, doing 1 hit only and at the range of 1. But if I have a guy suitable for this weapon, he would do a lot more damage with a greatsword.

Am I doing it wrong? How do I turn this weapon become useful in the game?

[gazomierz]

Greatsword isn't better than greataxe in all cases. That is just not true.

Generally you want to employ all weapons. As they all serve different purpose. In case of greatsword vs greataxe. Greatsword is pretty much dedicated aoe weapon. Greataxes are focus dmg weapons. They inflict much higher dmg against single targets. Due to split man hitting both head and body with each strike. They're great for taking down enemies fast. Like for sniping gobbo shamans, necros, orc warriors and such. Round swing is 100% secondary skill in case of greataxes, theyr'e about the basic attack.

Give your axeman qickhands and longaxe (as secondary weapon). Such merc is able of putting out tremendous amounts of focused dmg. You'll almost never miss out on berk and kf. With hammerer nearby to strip armour you can wreck even most tough enemies in no time. Due to greataxe's reliance on basic attack it is also very fatigue efficient. That's not true in case of flanker axeman tho, as he'll be roundswinging a lot.

Give him adrenaline to allow for sniping specials. They perform very well in that role.

Give him footwork to maximize the opportunities to make out the most out of this weapon. But you generally should have footwork on most 2hander builds.

As a flanker greataxe can work. If you're able to round swing safely ability is great. Just make sure you have some guy with footwork and rotation nearby to save the axeman's ass when/if things go south. Underdog essential for such build. Don't bother with lone wolf, it's better to always stay just 1 tile away from your main line. It's enough to make use of round swing without putting your own guys in danger and still keeps axeman merc kinda safe. If fighting orc warriors you might want to keep him 2 tiles away, so they won't render ability useless with just one displace.

That would be the essentials. I hope this helps. If you want more info do a search, I've written elaborate posts about greataxes in the past, there were some pretty interesting discussions on the subject.

This misperception of greataxes just keeps coming back :)

Edit:
Granted it's mostly down to playstyle. It's entirely possible you just won't feel comfortable with greataxes. And that's fine, it's greatswords that should build up the bunk of your 2handers. But I would strongly advise to try and learn and love the way of big chopy axe. And mix some of them into your band. I usually run 2 dedicated axemen. If I don't get warbrands/crypt cleavers I go for 3.

[ioci]

Many thanks, Gazomierz! Very inspiring and I have never considered using adrenaline bust for any of my guys. Will try it out on next run.

And I just read again the description of Split Men, it hit both head and body, how could I ever ignored that!

[gazomierz]

Glad to be of help.

On adrenaline. It's a great perk, a true equalizer. Think about it that way, after you act you can activate it and assure you'll go before the enemies nex turn. It has plenty of uses. Setting up for good rally. Hunting specials like I already mentioned. Massing it in combination with lots of 2handers, which let's you put out insane amounts of dmg whithout enemy retaliation (or minimized retaliation). And there's more.

Ofc it has it's drawbacks, mainly it's very fatigue intensive. But nothing is perfect :)

[Drathnar1]

Gazo as usual has covered it all. :)
I take Quick Hands and have other axes and a shield on mine as well and yes Underdog is vital for builds planning to get surrounded. Went for Rotation, but in retrospect, Footwork might have been a little better. Not really much else to add, but I'll chip in with a few fun pics because when the battle has largely already been decided, sometimes it's nice to go for "style points" :P
https://imgur.com/a/AoxFwuP

P/S - Not a big fan of Split Man when dealing with Raiders, but that's mostly because I'm a greedy *&^% and always want more loot to sell :P

[Akhorahil]

I'm unimpressed with the greataxe in general - unlike the 2H sword and hammer, the AoE is impractical - but when I found a nice magical one, I trained up a bro for it. The shieldbash was absurdly high.

In general, I think it's definitely worth it to train bros for nice weapons you find.

[Abel]

Great posts from everyone!

Like you and Akhorahil, I prefer Two-Handed Hammers because of Armor damage and Stagger and Greatswords because of Split. But I like to use Greataxes for Round Swings on the sides with this kind of build: https://battlebrothers.wikia.com/wiki/Late_Game_Builds#Berserker.
I think that's what you had in mind. And it's true you need quite a lot of Melee Skill and Fatigue to keep swinging and hitting.

But as Gazomierz pointed out, Axes Split Man is one of the most damaging single target attack. All the more when either body or head is left unprotected. So you can use Greataxes that way too, like Drathnar with Quick Hands and possibly Bags and Belts.

[ioci]

Originally posted by gazomierz:

Glad to be of help.

On adrenaline. It's a great perk, a true equalizer. Think about it that way, after you act you can activate it and assure you'll go before the enemies nex turn. It has plenty of uses. Setting up for good rally. Hunting specials like I already mentioned. Massing it in combination with lots of 2handers, which let's you put out insane amounts of dmg whithout enemy retaliation (or minimized retaliation). And there's more.

Ofc it has it's drawbacks, mainly it's very fatigue intensive. But nothing is perfect :)

Indeed, the fatigue it builds up was the reason I stayed away from this perk in the first place. The two-handed guys I had usually come short of stamina, around 60 at the middle phrase before the first crisis ends. I used to pick this perk for dodgy light armour guys to circling the special like the necromancer, but they are way too fragile, and just keep getting intercepted or simply got sniped.
But now I think I'm getting it, using the heavy guys to launch a full charge, crazy banzai style, trading armour and stamina of the heavy for closer distance to the high-value target during the first two rounds if it was gobo or undead. Will try it out.

[ioci]

Originally posted by Drathnar1:

P/S - Not a big fan of Split Man when dealing with Raiders, but that's mostly because I'm a greedy *&^% and always want more loot to sell :P

Haha! Everyone loves farming raiders, BB cycle of economic. xD

[ioci]

Thank you all guys, from now on I will try to love big axe more!

[gazomierz]

That's exactly what the idea is. Usually it allows for decimating enemy ranks and return dmg in 2nd turn is minimal. It's just a matter of cleanup. It doesn't work as well in really massive fights, there you have to take more conventional approach.

I hope you'll find this tactic to your liking. If you'd be interested I can give specific builds I use, weapon composition and so on.

Good luck in the field, Battle Brother!

[ioci]

Thank you Battle Brother Gazo, you have already given a lot of detail, I think I can walk this glorious path of devastating charge by my own now. Long may the sun shine!