Gauntlets/Knuckles are terrible

[Devarian]

I've enjoyed most weapons and they all normally have a balance. Hammers have high impact and decent damage but are incredibly slow, bows have range but have ammo, all 1h weapons are decent damage and impact mixture but have access to offhand items. Everything has a pretty decent balance.

The gauntlets have:
- Terrible frame data, when you do a sprinting attack with a spear you can dodge roll before an enemy swings, making it very useful for poking blockers. With Gauntlets you do a jump punch that does ridiculously low impact and you cannot move, attack, or dodge for about a second. That's absolutely horrid for a close up melee build, if you can't react after a dash attack unlike EVERY OTHER MELEE, then these have no point.

- Abysmal range. Of course they have the shortest range, but they make up for it with... uhh. I guess you can stack statuses really fast? Your impact is low, your damage is equal to a sword ONLY if you land both punches, and if you knock someone down from impact, you can't actually punch them since they will fall out of your attack range.

- Bad animations. LMB with gauntlets locks you into a one-two-punch combo. That's cool! I like that, aside from the fact that it does less damage and knockback than most weapons, is as fast or slower than swords, you have to hit both attacks in order to evenly trade, and if you click an extra time on accident you're locked into 4 attacks. But aside from all that, it looks cool..

This opinion may change over time, but as of now I've used Cloth, Iron, and Brutal Knuckles on Chersonese, Hallowed Marsh, and Antique Plateau enemies and they've all been underwhelming in comparison to pre-DLC weapons or new DLC spells.

Really hope they get tweeked a bit, I find them horribly weak.

[Midas]

I haven't bought the DLC yet. Usually the fistfighting options in most games are weaker but much faster. Is this not the case here? Or does the combat system just not support a flurry-of-attacks weapon very well?

[Devarian]

Originally posted by Midas:

I haven't bought the DLC yet. Usually the fistfighting options in most games are weaker but much faster. Is this not the case here? Or does the combat system just not support a flurry-of-attacks weapon very well?

The latter, they're faster but weaker of course. But in this game, most attacks you throw out either need to be after an opponent full combos' or assuming you're going to get a better trade.
Trading blows with the knuckles are absolutely atrocious since if your double attack gets interrupted you do SIGNIFICANTLY less damage. As well as enemy attacks will always beat out two small punches.
Other skill trees lend help like Monk parries, infusions, and Shaman's attack speed buff. But as a raw weapon, they're awful.
Other weapons like Spears, Halberds, Axes, and Claymores barely need extra skills to make useful, whereas knuckles if you dont have skills at the ready in bulk, you're screwed.

[Midas]

Originally posted by Kerillian:

Originally posted by Midas:

I haven't bought the DLC yet. Usually the fistfighting options in most games are weaker but much faster. Is this not the case here? Or does the combat system just not support a flurry-of-attacks weapon very well?

The latter, they're faster but weaker of course. But in this game, most attacks you throw out either need to be after an opponent full combos' or assuming you're going to get a better trade.
Trading blows with the knuckles are absolutely atrocious since if your double attack gets interrupted you do SIGNIFICANTLY less damage. As well as enemy attacks will always beat out two small punches.
Other skill trees lend help like Monk parries, infusions, and Shaman's attack speed buff. But as a raw weapon, they're awful.
Other weapons like Spears, Halberds, Axes, and Claymores barely need extra skills to make useful, whereas knuckles if you dont have skills at the ready in bulk, you're screwed.

Yeah, I was worried about that. The way combat works in Outward, you want to be staggering the enemy BEFORE you try to unload on them. What is the fist weapon's unique skill like? It sounds like this is the sort of situation where the weapon's associated attack skill should be a really solid impact opener that you can chain combos into.

[[ZG] Zan⁧⁧dorum]

It works best with speedster and the fist based ability, you can use probe with it to do some dumb staff and use speedster's invulnerability duration increase to allow you to just never be hit and get better dps than most things.

[Dewulf]

How do you craft brutal knuckles? I've been trying to craft iron and brutal knuckles for ages and can't seem to figure out the recipe. Also, I found out that best thing to do with knuckles is to just use probe till you add debuff on enemy, then use warrior monk skill Brace to get impact and knockback to enemy and then stagger them using basic fist combo.

[Devarian]

By this point I've learned a few things:
1. Probe is an absolute must have to damage ramp with gauntlets.
2. Parries are a must have in order to prevent damage and return damage, as well as activating Discipline.
3. To use Prismatic Flurry productively you need a LOT or ALL of the elemental buff spells, if you have 0-2 of the 5, it's pointless.
4. I have yet to find a gauntlet recipe.
5. Shaman is the best build as it increases your attack speed with the Wind Infusion.
6. Fights where you use Gauntlets take around 50% longer than any other weapon.

[Devarian]

Originally posted by Dewulf:

How do you craft brutal knuckles? I've been trying to craft iron and brutal knuckles for ages and can't seem to figure out the recipe. Also, I found out that best thing to do with knuckles is to just use probe till you add debuff on enemy, then use warrior monk skill Brace to get impact and knockback to enemy and then stagger them using basic fist combo.

You can't craft Brutal anything to my knowledge

[Midas]

Originally posted by Dewulf:

How do you craft brutal knuckles? I've been trying to craft iron and brutal knuckles for ages and can't seem to figure out the recipe. Also, I found out that best thing to do with knuckles is to just use probe till you add debuff on enemy, then use warrior monk skill Brace to get impact and knockback to enemy and then stagger them using basic fist combo.

No brutal or iron weapon can be crafted. They are often used FOR crafting, but you need to buy/find them.

[Tovias]

I saw this thread earlier and came back to it just to agree with the OP. Terrible weapons that simply leave you open to eat dirt without a lot of parry abilities.

[Wyrlish]

Haven't played the dlc yet but saw a clip where they one shotted a shell horror. they can't be that bad surely?

[MaskedMarauder]

The problem has more to do with the scaling of the weapons themselves. Tsar fists, porcelain fists, and to a more dubious extent horror fists are excellent weapons. Golden knuckles are good against ONE enemy type, which basically invalidates them. Marble fists are okay, mostly because they inflict confusion which allows you to use leg sweep to stack alertness levels/deal damage. Beyond that, all fist weapons are pretty much unusable. The impact is too low, and the lower tier fists don't have the damage to compensate for it.

I believe this is because the nature of fist weapons, and you hit the nail on the head. Fist weapons are raw dps weapons. If you can stand in one place and wail on 'em, I think they'll outdps everything except the greathammer (which is head and shoulders above all other weapons in the game, even the greataxe. Especially now that you can use prime and reduced cooldowns to spam juggernaut). But of course you need skills to do this, because they have "meh" impact damage (comparable to a 1h weapon). You need to be able to get in and stay in without having to worry about trading. Parry skills and unerring read are a must. And against more than one enemy at a time, the weaknesses of fist weapons really show. I will say that the power attacks of fist weapons are exceptionally powerful, and feel good besides. A lot of melee weapons suffer from the enemy getting knocked away from you. With fist weapons, it feels easy to stay on top of enemies as they get knocked back, hop back, or get knocked down.

Abusing alertness to stay at level 2 is super important, because probe inflicts confusion at level 2, and pain at level 3. Confusion means more impact damage (which you need) and the ability to leg sweep (which is generally not very good, but I believe it works VERY well for fist weapons due to the way they work). If you can leave and enter your fights at level 2 alertness, you will be able to consistently stack confusion and pain on targets which is when you start to feel like Mike Tyson or Muhammed Ali. Assuming of course you are using one of the four (arguably five) useful fist weapons and not the garbage tier weapons.

[Tovias]

There is more to gauntlets than end game content, if they are only functional when you use high tier versions then there is still an issue with scaling and accessibility.

[Terra Blade]

Maybe they work better with the rage buff? I feel that the devs kinda have this "ideal" build setup that they want you to take but don't "force" you to take. Kinda like with chakrams, which are also very build restricted but not "technically" build restricted.

[Devarian]

Returning to my thread:
There are some posts I agree with and others I will address.
1. End game knuckles are decent. Porcelain, Tsar, and Vampiric are pretty good.
2. Early game knuckles are still absolutely abysmal, cloth knuckles are laughable. Saying that "It's cause they're the early knuckles" isn't an excuse, a fishing spear can kill a Hyena in 6 hits, cloth knuckles can't in like 12.
3. There are no knuckle enchantments so you're stuck with the 2 catch-all enchantments.
4. Just because the sprinting attack is bad doesn't mean "you shouldn't use it" you are allowed to criticize parts of the game that need adjustment. You don't have to just deal with it being bad. Having more end-lag (frames where you can't do anything after an animation) than the greathammer on your sprinting attack is insanely ridiculous.
5. There is currently many glitches with the knuckles, most of which are the fact that your second hit doesn't actually connect that often. When fighting a mobile or simply just thin modeled enemy, you have a high chance of just whiffing the attack. Not because they dodged, but because your character stands completely still as you're punching you have a high chance to miss the second attack of any punch.
5b. This is a huge problem against the Lich family of enemies. Who are all thin models. I've killed all of the Liches so far, it's a nightmare with knuckles. Especially the new Lich.

[yuvhaim]

5? i havent tested it yet but rage and discipline are also boons and benefit from the hermit's passive skill. 7 strike might be possible though you cant have them all the time like the other boons wo potions