Shield traits

[Adelion]

Playing with Axe & Shield I, personally, feel comfortable. Although I only met one person in some hundred hours of playing who "criticized" the shield (normally, people don't utter a word about weapon choice in public games) I read in the Forum - from time to time - that shields are considered lackluster.

My personal problem is that I play mostly relying on pushing. As such I decided going for Opportunist as shield trait. Only to hear that it apparently doesn't work. So in effect, I played long time without any trait at all. I am now using the Parry trait and I think it is a nice addition. The off-balance trait while a great complement for the taunt ability is to passive for my taste as ideally I would not have to use my stamina to block. As result, it would be very situational.

So, I would like to have some kind of trait which strengthens a play-style centered around pushing. Opportunist (if actually working) could be this but only if it enables me to push elites while they are doing an overhead swing and plagues monks in their attack frenzy.
However, I would prefer some kind of mixing between Off-Balance and Opportunist which means that by staggering enemies with the shield they would for a short moment receive higher damage by subsequent melee attacks. It could help negating the reduced damage shield bearers are dishing out while also while strengthening shields further as a team-orientated tool. As you can easily stagger more enemies than blocking the effect should probably be less than for Off-Balance, so below 50 % (I know the actual effect is only 20 %). But not too low because it would have very limited use against elites otherwise.

As the trait might be strong on other weapons which have an already strong push-attack one could restrict this trait to shield weapons.
Generally, I would prefer a more diverse weapon trait system so that not all weapons have a near identical set and people always chose their one super-trait on all weapons. That this is possible can be seen with the Drake weapons which have an additional trait in comparison to other ranged dwarf weapons.

Any thoughts?

[plumboby]

i go with axe shield with my iron breaker build & xbow is so much more accurate & viable for the big stuff 1 shot kills. I try aim for extra push & block resistance & stamina buffs makes the diffrence with the shield axe.

[Calo Nord]

Swift slaying is all you need

[Ardariel]

5% aspeed. Miners rythm. Combine pushes and charged_1 to CC.

Usual sequence goes like that - Charged_1 charged_2 push light_1 lighg_2, repeat.

Ofc situation-based. Also if you got pistols you can use their blast to etend CC and damage, in this case you dont need rythm.

[CopperBack]

I judge shields in silence (bad), though rarely it's been useful, rarely. Killing it is more efficient... only bonus is knocking back a clump of hordes but you can shotgun that too. Oh a shield wall/block for rattling gun, fun useful.

[Adelion]

Well, thanks for the tips. But this is not about how to use pushing or how to control the crowd. This is about making a new TRAIT which complements such a playstyle.
Because off-balance does rely on blocking which I ideally don't have to do, Opportunist doesn't work as far as I know and - in my opinion - Swift Slaying is wasted on Axe & Shield.

Again, this is about making new traits which complement certain playstyles.

[Brennon]

I like that trait that makes everything you block take extra damage, at least for ironbreaker. Use your F, hold your shield up and watch your team shred a patrol a new ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ in no time

[Kilo]

They just need to fix the game.

[Ardariel]

Originally posted by Adelion:

Well, thanks for the tips. But this is not about how to use pushing or how to control the crowd. This is about making a new TRAIT which complements such a playstyle.
Because off-balance does rely on blocking which I ideally don't have to do, Opportunist doesn't work as far as I know and - in my opinion - Swift Slaying is wasted on Axe & Shield.

Again, this is about making new traits which complement certain playstyles.

Thats true. Still parry is good for any push-reliant playstyle, that reduce need in stamina.

[Artan]

Off balance all day. As a shield user your role is to make it eaier for your DPS to kill. Using charged attack shiled bash and push block to stagger enemies allows your dps to unload rather than go through their attacking and blocking rotation.

Off balance means you can block enemy attacks and in doing so give your team mates a damage bonus helping them kill even easier.

If using Krub take increased stamina on charged attack and use charged attack and push block to keep things staggered and maintain stamina.

If using Bardin take increased stamina regen whilst gromil armour is active to again maintain stamina whilst charged attack bashing and push block staggering.

Doing this means your a staggering, blocking & damage buff generating team player.

[Myrmidon]

I'm glad someone has pointed out the relatively niche applications of both Parry and Off-Balance on shields as they're usually bummed as standards. If you're blocking that often with your shield then you're being a terrible CC platform. Shoving intercepts many times more potential attacks for the same cost as absorbing single attacks statically through a block.

In V1 it was simple, you took Improved Pommel and it let you stagger loop hordes and patrols simultaniously and indefinitely. V2 the number of useful traits on shields are significantly diminished. Swift Slaying as a few others have said is a pretty viable choice as it's pretty good on just about any melee weapon, it procs often and it's something that's always useful. Like the OP 'Opportunist' was my first choice until I learned it didn't work properly.

Honestly Off-Balance and Parry should be combined into 1 trait. 50% for a few seconds is negligible on a shield anyway really, you don't take them for oomph you take them because they allow you to wittle swathes of enemies down with impunity, it's slow and safe as opposed to fast but risky.

[Ardariel]

Originally posted by Myrmidon:

I'm glad someone has pointed out the relatively niche applications of both Parry and Off-Balance on shields as they're usually bummed as standards. If you're blocking that often with your shield then you're being a terrible CC platform. Shoving intercepts many times more potential attacks for the same cost as absorbing single attacks statically through a block.

In V1 it was simple, you took Improved Pommel and it let you stagger loop hordes and patrols simultaniously and indefinitely. V2 the number of useful traits on shields are significantly diminished. Swift Slaying as a few others have said is a pretty viable choice as it's pretty good on just about any melee weapon, it procs often and it's something that's always useful. Like the OP 'Opportunist' was my first choice until I learned it didn't work properly.

Honestly Off-Balance and Parry should be combined into 1 trait. 50% for a few seconds is negligible on a shield anyway really, you don't take them for oomph you take them because they allow you to wittle swathes of enemies down with impunity, it's slow and safe as opposed to fast but risky.

20%, not 50%. And for 5 seconds, not 3. But yes, usability is questionable. Only on deeds i really feel that it is useful (wave or HFSB)

[lexx]

Shields are just worthless piles of garbage. Any other weapon avialble for tanks is better. Prove me wrong
Protip: You can't.

[Tamren]

Originally posted by lexx:

Shields are just worthless piles of garbage. Any other weapon avialble for tanks is better. Prove me wrong
Protip: You can't.

Shield tanks can pick people up while under skaven gunner fire. But yes, other than extremely niche cases that don't even come up once per game, other weapons are better. Even the 1h weapons without the shield have almost as much stamina and much higher DPS.

[Ardariel]

Originally posted by GWJ Tamren:

Originally posted by lexx:

Shields are just worthless piles of garbage. Any other weapon avialble for tanks is better. Prove me wrong
Protip: You can't.

Shield tanks can pick people up while under skaven gunner fire. But yes, other than extremely niche cases that don't even come up once per game, other weapons are better. Even the 1h weapons without the shield have almost as much stamina and much higher DPS.

Shields offer true CC, not mass limited, like even close to be godlike 2H hammer. Thats advantage. Shield wielder can hold skaven patrol and significantly slow down chaos patrol.

Ofc its questionable, cause you cna get conflag, for example. But saying that shields are useless and cant offer anything more than 1h weapon is totally incorrect. Its hard to carry team with sheild tho. If you havge 3 idiot DPS that cant survive even when you CC everything around - you would have hard time getting through solo (cause lack of mobility and low damage vs boss), but aside of that competent shield user is always good addition to the team. He let other players do much more damage.

[lexx]

A 1h hammer can hold a pat better than a shield, because dodge distance and the fact you can do some meaningful damage. The moment one of them hits you with a heavy attack, you can kiss your stamina and ass goodbye.