Berzerker: What do you Love/Hate?

[MikeHoncho]

Zerk's role is great in theory, but as mentioned, zerk can't tank worth a crap atm. And yes, having a medic who can throw down a nade to heal everyone while pulling aggro just as well as zerk is always preferable in my experience. Just because they aren't darting people doesn't mean they can't heal, and you would still have another dedicated healing medic to do that.

I know what the intended role for the zerk is, the problem is medic consistently does it better. Zerk doesn't do enough damage to the big zeds to warrant being so squishy. EMP nades do nothing to FPs so you're always better off with a healing nade that you can throw right at your feet to help tank in case you miss a parry. You can just circle strafe scrakes with any class so you don't even need to stop them with an EMP nade unless someone accidentally rages one. My success rate using a medic as a zerk is probably more than twice as high as when I go pure zerk (on suicidal). The only time I like using zerk is when I cheese the medic bonuses by swapping over between rounds. Then it feels more balanced. I don't feel like I need a dedicated medic just for me.

Also when it comes to Hans it's not even close. Medic is so much better. They can do everything in that fight including solo it when everyone else is dead. Again, this is just my opinion, but I have put in over 100 hours already, mostly on suicidal, and this is the current strategy that I see forming with successful teams on higher difficulties.

I think I have said enough in this thread. I will shut up now .

 

[Zerginfestor]

The berserker gets a benefit from a successful parry, which is only 1 point of armor or health lost. Parrying isn't that bad once you learn it honestly.

The damage on the berserker is fine imo.

What?
the benefit: What are you talking about? EVERY PERK GETS THAT BENEFIT, There's a reason pros tell others to 'whip your knife out' when Hans goes into melee range, or Scrake is getting close, to parry, get pathetic damage, and deal damage in return.

If Berserker really wants to be unique compared to others in the parrying scenario, either increase the parrying time window for the perk, or give the perk unique skills that focus on Parrying, like so:

http://forums.tripwireinteractive.com/showthread.php?t=106910

 

[「 yurica 」]

I believe the eviscerator would be much more usable if you can aim down sights with it.

 

[Kvasir94]

Stumbles, preventing rage, damage mitigation are of trivial importance on HoE. Your team should be dropping Scrakes in 3-4 seconds, since they pour in non-stop on later waves. If you're doing that, you'll never get to see stun/stumble animations play.

If you *have* to melee after wave 3, medic/medic is untouchable compared to medic/zerk. Medic/zerk has to kite constantly after wave 3 since the zerk gets gibbed if he's not always at 100hp, they can't go in balls deep to take out priority targets like medic/medic can (watch on HoE video with zerks and it always involves them running away the entire match). Plus a melee medic doesn't mean there's less healing. There's nothing stopping other people from going medic if one of them decides to focus on melee.

You need to play with better Zerks then. All of those skills are definitely not "trivial" on one of the difficulties where the Zeds sprint constantly and stumbling stops them dead in their tracks. Scrakes are not the only threat, but hey, you know what lets you take them out easily in 3-4 seconds? EMP grenades that belong to Zerk. Those are pretty much the scrake killer if you have a good team. the nailgun also contributes surprising damage to decapping an EMP'd zed.

Zerker also helps teams hold down one spot way better imo instead of running. I don't know who you're watching play but running is a last resort for any class when you're in trouble. Zerks actually help prevent the whole team from having to run away because they're pretty much capable of stopping whole crowds of zeds repeatedly and throwing EMPs. Both methods disable special attacks momentarily on the medium Zeds (husk, siren, bloat) and that's at a range so you never have to be in danger.

Zerks have a max 30% damage resist with their own perks and that counts for your health too. The way they messed this up vs KF1 is by giving medics the crazy strong ability to repair armor, making armor a refillable tanking resource and making straight damage resistance (that's healable) less appealing. I would surely take the 30% damage res and 100 armor + the ten HP refill every zed time or extension of zed time over med's armor if medic was not able to heal everyone's armor back up so quickly.

Even in HoE the class totally does have a purpose. He completely destroys waves 1 - 4 and after that he has more control options for big and small zeds than any other class. A med with pulverizer out is a med that is not healing. It's that simple. Yes, they need something to seperate them a bit more. No, Zerk is not a useless underpowered class like I read multiple times a day. Zerk is just one of the harder classes to play right now but he absolutely does have everything you need to help keep you and your team alive.

Skilled Zerker + Skilled Med combo for life.

 

[outofrealman]

TBH the only benefit of a berserker right now is the EMP nade, which enables a easy kill of scrakes for commandos. This is the only reliable way to do all these "you only need to headshot a 6-man HOE scrake 20 times to kill it".

If you want someone to block the doorway, medic with the pluv is better in this role. Medic nade tanking can make a medic tank a fleshpound on HOE for like 10 seconds while keep swinging without needing to parry. If a berserker do this, he need to parry/stumble chain perfectly if he dont want to die too quickly. And parrying do no damage at all (which is the thing I hate the most, why even parry when you can run away?)

 

[Rocker Fox]

*snip*.

The main problem is that the zerker needs a bunch of super special things to happen in order for it's skills to kick in vs other perks and the zerker has to deal with one thing the other classes don't: Constantly being in melee range.

Seriously, that is the one big problem i have with playing zerker, there is a whole set of skills that require you to either be crippled before they even kick in or they are a % chance to happen. With every other perk not only do they get to sit at range (except from Support arguably but they still get to sit further away than zerker and get a skill that gives them 150 hp at level 10) and have no strings attached to their bonuses.

With zerker it's take damage for this and take damage for that which would make sense if it got a larger buff vs the other perks but it doesn't. The stagger caps at 25% which 5% less than the commando one and 15% for the support on which is hitting with more pellets and gets the range element on top of NOT HAVING TO TAKE A TON OF DAMAGE! If you have a good medic as well you get no bonuses which i guess is prefered since your not at a constant state of near death. The only skills that don't require low hp or a % chance to happen are Balk Ammo, Night Vision, Fakeout, Formidable and the 2 25 zed time skills.

That is 4 skills out of 10 (6 out of 10 if you count the zed time skills as a chance to happen thing) which require either chance or low hp. No other perk has to deal with that, seriously, look at it.

Commando only has impact as a chance thing, Support has Bombard and Medic has none unless you count the second part of Acidic Compound so i guess that counts as 0.5 of a skill or if you count the zed time stuff a max of 3 each out of 10. This is once again considering zerker has to stick in melee to be most effective.

I like the feel of zerker, i like emp nades for killing husks and sirens as well as helping the team, i love the weapon concepts and being able to stumble and kill scrakes by screaming "Stop, hammer time!" and slamming them with the pulverizer. I really, really like how the parry system

What i don't like is how nearly half of the skills are useless if you have a good medic or are unlucky. It feels like a load of crap that the zerker has to sit in melee and have situational skills vs every other perk, especailly since it's either the same bonuses or less bonuses. It just seems a little nutty to me is all.

 

[Kvasir94]

.

The thing is that the only perk that's actually RNG is half of one perk and the other half of said perk should be killer once "Knockdown" is actually implemented. Nothing else in Zerk's tree is RNG. No perk that increases stumble "chance" is actually "random" or "chance" at all. It's a flat increase to your weapon's "Stumble power" value and more people need to learn this before saying anything about the stumbling perks.

The increase to stumble chance on lower HP is enough to make you still stumble Scrakes with a melee gun bash @ 85 HP no matter their health and at 70HP you can stumble them with a single nailgun nail, going back and forth stumbling him, then leg stumbling him before the 1st stumble is up. Both types of stumble are on seperate timers and each one resets in 3 seconds (after the stumble begins not ends.) Both of these facts allow you to assist in killing scrakes with only your nailgun (aka at at least a slight range). Nailgun also does not suffer from the -50% damage resist Fleshpounds have to all firearms. Meaning in a practical manner it is like doing double damage to the FP (same with explosives).

Oh, and let's not forget that the "Stun" state isn't even utilized yet, but Zerk has a bonus to it during ZED time. Stun (I assume standing up straight and still like KF1) and Knockdown (The zed completely ragdolls onto the ground while still alive) states are both going to be extremely powerful and far better than Stumbles.

What Zerk needs is a way to self-damage and then "turn off" healing from medics, maybe showing a symbol that they cannot be healed and returning any dart % back to the medic that accidentally tries to heal you.

I would maybe like to see Zerk have the ability to inject himself or harm himself (only hp not armor), after which you could go into a "no heals berzerk" type mode. You would be unable to be healed for the duration or until you disable it but you could be given something like 15% (instead of or in addition to the 5%) damage resist ONLY while berzerk mode is active. Before you say this is too low remember with Intimidate enemies you melee deal 25% less damage already for their lifetime and to your team as well (15% is a typo).

After the duration/disabling the mode, you would receive reduced healing possibly for around 3 - 5 seconds. Maybe 30 - 50 percent as effective as the normal heal, but you could maybe still receive full armor points from armament? That would probably be too strong as you would be able to completely fill your armor with how slow you would regen HP from a dart. Maybe make it so you get half of the armament points.

I think this would balance out the risk/reward (might even be too strong still), allow him to make use of amazing perks like Furious Defender and keep medics from ruining his plans in random pub games. It could add a whole new layer to the class to differentiate it. You could go in and make use of those perks while still actually having armor and you could put yourself in that risky position on your own terms. Additionally, this would supply some of the extra damage resistance people are looking for on top of parry/blocks.

Keep in mind that with this extra damage res during zerk mode, blocking with a melee weapon would cancel out almost all of the attack. Blocking, not even parrying, but only when that mode is active.

I also think seeing a Zerker bleed himself or shoot up some potent stimulants and go on a bit of a rampage would be so metal.

Does anyone else think this would keep the whole "low health and go crazy" type aspect and risk, while also being a cool function of the class? I think it would be very fitting and add lots of skill to his already reasonably skillful playstyle. I mean, control over your skills seems to be what people want and this would be a cool and risk/reward way to trigger these powerful but situational perks (mainly furious defender as frenzy needs a buff).

 

[jestdoit]

You need to play with better Zerks then.

I don't know who you're watching play but running is a last resort for any class when you're in trouble.

That's right. Every zerk on HoE has so far been nothing but a liability. But go ahead and record an entire HoE match, showing us all how wonderful your zerk is. Better not be a wave 1-3 montage, because honestly, who cares about that - those are the free econ rounds anyway. We'll be waiting.

There's a lot in your post that make me question if you have any actual experience on HoE past wave 3:

-For starters, you're using a nailgun. All the successful "pro" zerks are actually buying AA12's (and leaving spares behind with excess dosh).

-You talk about 30% damage resist like it actually matters, like it even has the chance to kick in. I'd love to see how you're running up to the clusters of medium+large zeds that are constantly spawning, how you're hitting all the husks/sirens/bloats that come in multiple ranks from every direction screened by permasprint trash.

-You completely overrating EMPs. As if people actually care about them when they don't even stop FPs, and not realizing damage breaks the effect anyway. As if you have enough grenades to make a difference, as if you're taking boxes away from the classes who need it more.

-You don't seem to realize level 25 commandos/supports are infinitely better at clearing everything, as if they're not just gibbing everything with combined fire on sight. How come your team has time to see stun animations anyway? Maybe it's because you're on their team blocking their shots?

 

[Savage Rodent]

What?
the benefit: What are you talking about? EVERY PERK GETS THAT BENEFIT, There's a reason pros tell others to 'whip your knife out' when Hans goes into melee range, or Scrake is getting close, to parry, get pathetic damage, and deal damage in return.

If Berserker really wants to be unique compared to others in the parrying scenario, either increase the parrying time window for the perk, or give the perk unique skills that focus on Parrying, like so:

http://forums.tripwireinteractive.com/showthread.php?t=106910

Yeah you're right. There is absolutely no benefit. I don't know how this slipped by them.

And you still don't get the movement speed bonus with the nailgun. You do with the eviscerator though. I want to say there is a bug or something there.

 

[Kvasir94]

That's right. Every zerk on HoE has so far been nothing but a liability. But go ahead and record an entire HoE match, showing us all how wonderful your zerk is. Better not be a wave 1-3 montage, because honestly, who cares about that - those are the free econ rounds anyway. We'll be waiting.

There's a lot in your post that make me question if you have any actual experience on HoE past wave 3:

-For starters, you're using a nailgun. All the successful "pro" zerks are actually buying AA12's (and leaving spares behind with excess dosh).

-You talk about 30% damage resist like it actually matters, like it even has the chance to kick in. I'd love to see how you're running up to the clusters of medium+large zeds that are constantly spawning, how you're hitting all the husks/sirens/bloats that come in multiple ranks from every direction screened by permasprint trash.

-You completely overrating EMPs. As if people actually care about them when they don't even stop FPs, and not realizing damage breaks the effect anyway. As if you have enough grenades to make a difference, as if you're taking boxes away from the classes who need it more.

-You don't seem to realize level 25 commandos/supports are infinitely better at clearing everything, as if they're not just gibbing everything with combined fire on sight. How come your team has time to see stun animations anyway? Maybe it's because you're on their team blocking their shots?

So it sounds like what the game really needs is an AA12 nerf and a SCAR nerf based on what you're saying. Why not just replace every weapon with the AA12 since it deals the most damage? It shouldn't be an optimal strategy to off-class AA12 on everything and stack them on the ground. I still like my infinite range 1-shot trash killing 42 round magazine zed stumbling machine. Not to mention the backup ammo it has.


"Pro" zerks as if this game has a competitive scene or ranking. You mean people that you know who play Zerk?


You're also implying 30% damage resist doesn't matter whatsoever. What amount would matter then? 75? 100? Parries already stop 90% and literally holding down the button for any amount of time blocks 50% if you find yourself in a bad moment where you really need to block it. It's ridiculous to say resisting 30 - 45% doesn't matter in the slightest on any difficulty, especially since it would stack with block/parry. Resisted damage is resisted damage.


lol @ overrating EMPs. EMPs are some of the most useful tools the berzerker has right now and pretty much everyone agrees on that one. You can conserve them for sticky situations if your team is as good as you say and your supports are running supplier. EMPs are also not broken by damage as far as I have ever seen before. You can still EMP Fleshpounds with 2 just fine to disable their rage (but you're better off parrying once quickly imo) and they're the best way to take out Scrake's efficiently and quickly.


I'm not completely against people saying Berzerker is underpowered compared to other classes but with all this complaining about how useless and awful it is they're going to end up way over-buffing it and that'll be pretty sad. Some of the suggestions for "fixing" the class are just plain boring or terrible.

 

[outofrealman]

What I really dont understand is WHY would you stop a FP rage with 2/5 of your nades? You take what? 15 extra damage? 20? Come on.... this is a waste of nade in my book.... use it on the siren closing by, the scrakes or those 10 gorefasts charging your medic. Not to mention I dont think EMP count as explosive, so EMP will do next to no damage to FPs...

 

[jestdoit]

So it sounds like what the game really needs is an AA12 nerf and a SCAR nerf based on what you're saying.

No, what I'm saying is you have no idea what you're talking about, that you're exposing yourself as someone who has 0 experience on HoE. You using sub-optimal joke weapons that nobody ever bothers with except on low difficulties gives it away. I'm saying you're making up theories based on fantasy and wishful thinking, tailored for low-level play.

You're also implying 30% damage resist doesn't matter whatsoever. What amount would matter then? 75? 100? Parries already stop 90% and literally holding down the button for any amount of time blocks 50% if you find yourself in a bad moment where you really need to block it. It's ridiculous to say resisting 30 - 45% doesn't matter in the slightest on any difficulty, especially since it would stack with block/parry. Resisted damage is resisted damage.

You totally dodged my point. You need to physically go up to things and hit them with melee attacks to get 30% damage reduction.

I'd love to see how you're running up to the clusters of medium+large zeds that are constantly spawning, how you're hitting all the husks/sirens/bloats that come in multiple ranks from every direction screened by permasprint trash.

Moreover, show us how/why you're parrying and stunning things on HoE, when that is NOT the way people are winning, when it's the last thing anyone cares about (since they get instantly broken), when people are using for more effective/safer methods of dealing with zeds up close.

I'll be waiting for that video of your HoE run. But it's probably not going to come since you don't actually play HoE.

 

[Kvasir94]

No, what I'm saying is you have no idea what you're talking about, that you're exposing yourself as someone who has 0 experience on HoE. You using sub-optimal joke weapons that nobody ever bothers with except on low difficulties gives it away. I'm saying you're making up theories based on fantasy and wishful thinking, tailored for low-level play.




You totally dodged my point. You need to physically go up to things and hit them with melee attacks to get 30% damage reduction.



Moreover, show us how/why you're parrying and stunning things on HoE, when that is NOT the way people are winning, when it's the last thing anyone cares about (since they get instantly broken), when people are using for more effective/safer methods of dealing with zeds up close.

I'll be waiting for that video of your HoE run. But it's probably not going to come since you don't actually play HoE.

Nailgun is a joke weapon. Okay sure. Once again, who are you talking about that agrees with you on it being "sub-optimal" and a joke weapon, your friends? I haven't seen anyone else say that. Your strats and testing =/= everyone else's experience. If only the nailgun had the full zerk running speed, I would have 0 issues with its balance. If this is a game where any weapon but AA12 is "sub-optimal" then that is a big problem.

Nothing I'm saying is tailored for "low-level" play. The tactics work extremely well on Suicidal (Which I guess you could argue is low-level if you want to go that far) and I've had pretty good luck so far doing what I always do on HoE as well. I've played a couple random HoE games and 1 or 2 pickup type games with random decent players I met. No, I don't have much HoE experience past wave 7 of a long game (I don't play solo and I don't have enough decent friends to do a 6-man HoE run with actual comms either). I don't know if it will disappoint or satisfy you, but I'm not recording a video of an HoE run just to try to prove something. I've never once said I have beat HoE yet. That doesn't completely invalidate my opinion.

All I'm telling you is that "My meta is the best and only way because it works for my team" is ridiculous when the game is so fresh. All of these tactics are viable if done in the right situation and you shouldn't just disregard learning them because your team is stacking AA12s on the ground. HoE is not that insanely high of a bar. In my experience, it's not some magically impossible thing if you don't run exactly the "right" weapons (aa12 aa12 aa12) and tactics like you're making it out to be.

That's not to say there are not joke weapons in the game like the Combat Shotgun but I'm pretty sure you're only saying Nailgun is a "sub-optimal joke" weapon because you can carry an AA12 instead. Something is just not right about that and I can't see it staying how it is now.

We can sit here and debate my experience or skills all day but it's not very productive. Let's just not let the meta get too cheesy and stale just yet. It's like saying you shouldn't learn to parry (game mechanic) because circle-cheesing is way more effective/optimal (bug/game mechanic that will probably get changed very soon). I am curious to see what Zerk changes will come and if they will take it slowly or overbuff him.

I hate forum arguments and I don't really want to continue much longer. I tried to make my point and people can try the stuff I'm saying if they want to see for themselves. There's not much else to say.

 

[Wratts]

I love the weapons, and the style, and the overall feel of playing Berserker. The whole feel of how the weapons just plow through Zed hordes is incredibly satisfying. I disagree with a lot of things said throughout this thread. The balance of certain weapons like the Crovel, Vlad, and Pulverizer feels spot on.

But there's a couple of problems with the Perk overall:

1. It's not newbie-friendly. New players need a crash course in how to properly utilize all the melee techniques. Overhead swing, sideways sweep, light or heavy attacks, block, and parry. Also that you can and should aim for the head, just like with a gun. These things are not necessarily obvious, and make a huge difference in the Berserker's performance. I'm pretty sure that this is what turns off a lot of new players from the Perk: they try out the Berserker and are underwhelmed in how it performs in melee, then they buy the Vlad and then they switch Perks to something that uses guns.

2. It's not built to last well in high difficulty settings. While it's not newbie-friendly, it's an incredibly useful and powerful Perk to have on the team in Normal/Hard mode when in capable hands. But it feels lacking in Suicidal/HoE due to how quickly the Zeds just rip through your armor and HP.

3. Some of the passive stats on the Perk seem off. So far, it's the only Perk that has a couple of static values next to a few dynamic, level-based stats.

4. The Eviscerator. The fact that you can't block or parry with this thing makes it feel inferior to other Tier-4 weapons, and is an odd choice to me because, given its size and weight, it seems like something you could easily use as a shield. IMO you're better off working with a Pulverizer for most of the waves, and trading that in for an AA12 come boss fight. It's a very cool weapon, but especially when fighting a Scrake, Fleshpound or the boss, it feels rather useless. A cool feature that would justify this weapon more would be if you could block/parry with it, and it inflicts some HP damage to the attacker due to its blades when you do so.


Especially concerning #2 and #3 up there, I see a problem in balancing the Perk. Any buff you introduce so it makes the Perk more viable for high difficulty matches risks making it overpowered for low difficulty settings.

A way to mitigate a lot of these issues is to introduce more useful Skills than the ones the Berserker has, for the most part. Some random ideas off the top of my head: A skill that...

• ... restores a bit of armor to the Berserker when they kill a Zed within 2 meters of another player. (Fits their whole "garage warrior" theme well. Jury-rigging those armor mods.)
• ... provides damage resistance boosts proportional to the HP the Berserker has lost. (Rage toughens the hide!)
• ... provides damage resistance boosts for each player within 2 meters of the Berserker. ("Strength in numbers.")
• ... enlarges the window within which you have to time your block for a successful parry, proportional to the HP the Berserker has lost. ("Back to the wall.")
• ... allows you to more quickly draw Berserker weapons. ("Ready for action.")

 

[Senario]

I love the weapons, and the style, and the overall feel of playing Berserker. The whole feel of how the weapons just plow through Zed hordes is incredibly satisfying. I disagree with a lot of things said throughout this thread. The balance of certain weapons like the Crovel, Vlad, and Pulverizer feels spot on.

But there's a couple of problems with the Perk overall:

1. It's not newbie-friendly. New players need a crash course in how to properly utilize all the melee techniques. Overhead swing, sideways sweep, light or heavy attacks, block, and parry. Also that you can and should aim for the head, just like with a gun. These things are not necessarily obvious, and make a huge difference in the Berserker's performance. I'm pretty sure that this is what turns off a lot of new players from the Perk: they try out the Berserker and are underwhelmed in how it performs in melee, then they buy the Vlad and then they switch Perks to something that uses guns.

2. It's not built to last well in high difficulty settings. While it's not newbie-friendly, it's an incredibly useful and powerful Perk to have on the team in Normal/Hard mode when in capable hands. But it feels lacking in Suicidal/HoE due to how quickly the Zeds just rip through your armor and HP.

3. Some of the passive stats on the Perk seem off. So far, it's the only Perk that has a couple of static values next to a few dynamic, level-based stats.

4. The Eviscerator. The fact that you can't block or parry with this thing makes it feel inferior to other Tier-4 weapons, and is an odd choice to me because, given its size and weight, it seems like something you could easily use as a shield. IMO you're better off working with a Pulverizer for most of the waves, and trading that in for an AA12 come boss fight. It's a very cool weapon, but especially when fighting a Scrake, Fleshpound or the boss, it feels rather useless. A cool feature that would justify this weapon more would be if you could block/parry with it, and it inflicts some HP damage to the attacker due to its blades when you do so.


Especially concerning #2 and #3 up there, I see a problem in balancing the Perk. Any buff you introduce so it makes the Perk more viable for high difficulty matches risks making it overpowered for low difficulty settings.

A way to mitigate a lot of these issues is to introduce more useful Skills than the ones the Berserker has, for the most part. Some random ideas off the top of my head: A skill that...

• ... restores a bit of armor to the Berserker when they kill a Zed within 2 meters of another player. (Fits their whole "garage warrior" theme well. Jury-rigging those armor mods.)
• ... provides damage resistance boosts proportional to the HP the Berserker has lost. (Rage toughens the hide!)
• ... provides damage resistance boosts for each player within 2 meters of the Berserker. ("Strength in numbers.")
• ... enlarges the window within which you have to time your block for a successful parry, proportional to the HP the Berserker has lost. ("Back to the wall.")
• ... allows you to more quickly draw Berserker weapons. ("Ready for action.")

I think the main problem with more damage resist for lower hp idea is the fact that having low hp is never a good thing. If I play a medic and I see a teammate that is even slightly below full hp, I'm healing them. If not to keep them alive then for the small amount of xp I will get. Low hp skills or conditions rely on a bad medic or being far away from your medic (where you likely would die on Suicidal).

What matters here isn't that the perk is good on Hard or Normal. Everything is good at that level. What matters is that it is viable at leas ton Suicidal difficulty because that is where this game shines. Suicidal is a bunch of fun with all the zeds literally sprinting at you. Really, there is no reason to have a perk that is not viable at a high level. This is not a PVP game, this is a PVE game and being able to play what you want and still have it work is important.

That is why KF1 was so good, pretty much every class had something going for it at any difficulty. Demo was good against FP, Berserker could clear out trash and take care of some big zeds easier, Sharp could take care of big zeds and Patty, Firebug's burn decreased damage that zeds do when they are crisped(and cleared trash), commando cleared trash, support did a lot of dmg close up.

 

[jestdoit]

Nailgun is a joke weapon. Okay sure. O

Your team is much better off if you buy anything besides zerk weapons. Medic AR/AA-12 (best choices), SCAR, take your pick.

Nailgun has the highest TTK's when it matters (med/big zeds), and stuns don't get the chance to play on HoE. You don't even get any benefit from using a nailgun - your class speed boost only applies to the melee weapons.

 

[Wratts]

I think the main problem with more damage resist for lower hp idea is the fact that having low hp is never a good thing. If I play a medic and I see a teammate that is even slightly below full hp, I'm healing them. If not to keep them alive then for the small amount of xp I will get. Low hp skills or conditions rely on a bad medic or being far away from your medic (where you likely would die on Suicidal).

Didn't think about that, because I was mainly riffing off of the current Perk Skills (which use that HP loss condition for bonuses). That's a very good point; you're absolutely right about that. I play Medic as much as Berserker and my instinct as Medic is to try to top people's HP off. Especially in the higher difficulties, not doing so usually means people start getting eaten alive.

Another idea I've read before is something I'd love to see. Not for a Skill but just for the Perk overall, would be to broaden the window of frames during which Berserkers can successfully parry. It would really help because it's in theme with the Perk to be able to use that more reliably and to compensate for some lag.

 

[Senario]

Didn't think about that, because I was mainly riffing off of the current Perk Skills (which use that HP loss condition for bonuses). That's a very good point; you're absolutely right about that. I play Medic as much as Berserker and my instinct as Medic is to try to top people's HP off. Especially in the higher difficulties, not doing so usually means people start getting eaten alive.

Another idea I've read before is something I'd love to see. Not for a Skill but just for the Perk overall, would be to broaden the window of frames during which Berserkers can successfully parry. It would really help because it's in theme with the Perk to be able to use that more reliably and to compensate for some lag.

So far I've been able to parry just fine on 100< ping servers however I do agree that parries being client side or at least compensating more for lag is a big deal. The trick isn't to try and parry the first hit, the trick is to back away then parry the almost guaranteed second swipe with scrake. Don't bother with FP.

That said, any damage breaking stumble is really really bad for any type of parry tactic. What is the point in parrying besides not dying to the hit (only to get swiped at again)? The stumble doesn't last. You can't counter attack very well.

My opinion on parry is that while it is nice to have, when every class in the game can do it with their knife it either needs to be extraordinarily special on melee classes...or their focus needs to not be on parrying which has such a low amount of benefit on harder difficulties anyway. A dead Scrake is better than a stumbled scrake. And you can usually dodge to the right to avoid non raged scrakes + 1 raged scrake.

Berserker imo just needs a few things, around 30% general damage resist at lvl 25, at least the same amount of bloat bile resist as medic(possibly same with siren and scaling with level), and a reworked skill tree. The lvl 25 should make you feel powerful and not be some silly zed time perk skill. This goes for all classes but for Berserker....

I'd like to see one side of the tree being damage oriented and let you one shot any trash mob with a body shot. Level 25 being the big skill that pushes you into that kind of trash crowd control monster. Taking out big zeds would be easier, but not easier than something that is probably going to be very efficient such as sharpshooter vs scrake and demo vs fp.

The other side being increased max hp, less damage for zeds you hit, and the lvl 25 being more damage resist or something that makes them a monster tank. You won't be doing a ton of damage, but you'll be supporting your team and will not need constant attention from a medic because you are kinda hard to kill. Scrakes eat through hp very fast compared to armor on hard difficulties so I don't see a problem with giving them a lot of effective hp if their damage is around the level it is now. Trash mobs die in 2 hits to the body, 1 hit to head.

Then balance the two sides by making hybrid styles not as powerful in either regard but a bit less min-maxed.

I'd love to see Martial Artist be like a Melee sharpshooter. Taking out high priority big zeds easily and quickly.

 

[Maddoxx]

I hate the cumbersome shovel and the katana is crap...

When will we get an axe?

 

[RaZDaZ]

- Shovel is a lot of fun to use, fast paced with satisfying attacks
- Nailgun, didn't like it at first but this thing is a monster against trash
- Pulverizer light attack feels too weak especially at lower levels, right attack is satisfying but does seem slightly too weak or difficult to accurately land hits
- Eviscerator is useless, this weapon needs to be overhauled

- Most perks suck in a team environment, seems like some of them are built to solo stuff or in other cases, balanced around having more weapons
- Extra ammo perk seems almost completely useless but there might be more ranged weapons

- EMP grenades are amazing
- Until you reach higher levels, berserker feels way too easy to get killed

So far I'm level 23 so I haven't tried the 25 perks yet but they look cool.