Two Handed,- and Dual Wield Axes' Bleed Effect Issue

Dharack

First of all, greetings community,

This is my first post here on the forum and I'd like to discuss a problem regarding axes in the game and their viability in PvE content.

Secondly, I'm absolute ax-nut and would love to equip myself both with a two handed, as well as two one-handed axes, carving my way through creatures, but sadly there is one game mechanic that is tied to the choice of your weapons of these two skilltree lines, speaking of the bleeding effect that axes cause.

From atop of my head there is at least one creature species that defies this bleeding effect, speaking of Undeads, they are simply immune to bleeding, making the passive skill utterly void when facing these foes.

I get that axes are terrifying weapons, known for causing deep wounds in your opponents flesh, yet from a sole mechanical standpoint it doesn't work up to par, when reflected upon it, right next to the flat dmg bonus of swords and armor penetration of maces. Even though this might seem like a simple minor thing to gripe about, it absolutely tailors into the final choice of arsenal.

This is a real shame for someone who simply loves axes, their feel and ontop of that I absolutely adore some of the designs, TESO provides, for my weapon of choice.

I actually find it very cool, that certain enemies have immunities to certain status effects, though in my oppinion it's wrongly placed if it affects a passive, that narrows down my playfield of simple preference.

Would a change be realistic, bringing the weapon arch type up to par with the other two weapon styles & what do you think about the addressed issue?

Cheers

Thejollygreenone

Dharack wrote: »

First of all, greetings community,

This is my first post here on the forum and I'd like to discuss a problem regarding axes in the game and their viability in PvE content.

Secondly, I'm absolute ax-nut and would love to equip myself both with a two handed, as well as two one-handed axes, carving my way through creatures, but sadly there is one game mechanic that is tied to the choice of your weapons of these two skilltree lines, speaking of the bleeding effect that axes cause.

From atop of my head there is at least one creature species that defies this bleeding effect, speaking of Undeads, they are simply immune to bleeding, making the passive skill utterly void when facing these foes.

I get that axes are terrifying weapons, known for causing deep wounds in your opponents flesh, yet from a sole mechanical standpoint it doesn't work up to par, when reflected upon it, right next to the flat dmg bonus of swords and armor penetration of maces. Even though this might seem like a simple minor thing to gripe about, it absolutely tailors into the final choice of arsenal.

This is a real shame for someone who simply loves axes, their feel and ontop of that I absolutely adore some of the designs, TESO provides, for my weapon of choice.

I actually find it very cool, that certain enemies have immunities to certain status effects, though in my oppinion it's wrongly placed if it affects a passive, that narrows down my playfield of simple preference.

Would a change be realistic, bringing the weapon arch type up to par with the other two weapon styles & what do you think about the addressed issue?

Cheers

Totally agreed in that the axe's weapon-specific passive of bleed damage is pretty bad, in a number of ways. As you mentioned, there's the immunity problem, and furthermore there's the problem of how little these bleeds do damage-wise.

If the 2h bonus to swords is 5% flat damage increase, the bleed from a 2h axe better damn well provide the same dps increase as its weapon counterpart. Hell, that should count for maces too, honestly I think the armor penetration is REALLY underwhelming.

As a whole I think that the diversity between the type of weapon you use when using DW or 2H needs to be much more significant than it is. The difference between axes swords maces and daggers in DW and 2H play should rival the difference between frost staves fire staves and lightning staves, IMO.

That would go a long way to make these styles of play more appealing and even more effective if tweaked correctly. But coming back to the specific subject of axes and bleeds, I also am a personal aesthetic fan of axes. It's something I've always done in previous TES games as my choice of melee weapon. The mediocre bleed damage in the DW and 2H trees does this style of weapon no justice.

But to reiterate, I think the bonuses given for each weapon type should be re-evaluated to add more impact and benefit to the players choice in weapon, something that is virtually non-existent right now. During said re-evaluation, axes would hopefully just get a complete rework for this passive.

That really needs to be looked at, so once again I'll state I totally agree with you. ^.^

Tobiz

Speaking of axes, have they fixed the bleeds stacking?
Cleave bleed vs Heavy weapon passive bleed.
The lack of ui to make sure what works and not is making things hard to check in this game.

Dharack

Tobiz wrote: »

Speaking of axes, have they fixed the bleeds stacking?
Cleave bleed vs Heavy weapon passive bleed.
The lack of ui to make sure what works and not is making things hard to check in this game.

I was not aware of such a bug, since I've never used bleeding outside of the "Carve" ability, I will make sure to check later and document the outcome.

PS: Add-ons provide a valueable intel on such stats, I'd say it's even mandatory for an MMORPG, but that's not the topic here, so let's not dwell on that issue.

reagen_lionel

My only problem with weapon types is you actually have to specialize in thier special functions.

In my opinion. the bleed from axe, sword bonus and armor penetration of Swords and maces should be with weapons by default, and specced points should further increase thier effectiveness.

Doesnt make much sense that you specialize in hammers and somehow you suddenly learn how to bash through things.

My second thing is thier effects should scale better, at least for axes. Hammers should always have that flat percentage bonus. Nothing should be a flat number with thier effects. Only thing that should be flat numbers with effects is enchantments.

It will make every weapon seem viable and have thier own appeal.

Dharack

reagen_lionel wrote: »

My only problem with weapon types is you actually have to specialize in thier special functions.

In my opinion. the bleed from axe, sword bonus and armor penetration of Swords and maces should be with weapons by default, and specced points should further increase thier effectiveness.

Doesnt make much sense that you specialize in hammers and somehow you suddenly learn how to bash through things.

My second thing is thier effects should scale better, at least for axes. Hammers should always have that flat percentage bonus. Nothing should be a flat number with thier effects. Only thing that should be flat numbers with effects is enchantments.

It will make every weapon seem viable and have thier own appeal.

I disagree, it actually makes sense after spending points into a skill to get more proficient with a weapon.

There's no appeal to a weapon which's effect, for which you spend skillpoints, is useless against a great branch of enemies, unless it's effect is vastly superior in general in relation to the other weapon types, that would be balanced and make sense, but since this is also a PvP game the game would become immediately unbalanced, hence why I suggested a change of the bleed effect, simply making it good against everything (like swords and maces do).

Unless ZoS manages to seperate PvE and PvP mechanically (which would probably fix a great deal of class imbalances).

One interesting mechanic for axes could be an applied debuff, i.e to the overall dmg output or the like, to the hit target, due to pain cased from deep wounds.

Dharack

Tobiz wrote: »

Speaking of axes, have they fixed the bleeds stacking?
Cleave bleed vs Heavy weapon passive bleed.
The lack of ui to make sure what works and not is making things hard to check in this game.

Just tested if the Bleeding stacks; the bug apparently has been fixed, for both bleeds proc appropriately for 11Bleeding dps and 37Carve dps (the earlier being the passive bleed and the latter being Carve's after bleeding effect).

Yeah, 11dmg every second for 10 seconds (refreshed after every attack) makes this every underwhelming.

reagen_lionel

Dharack wrote: »

reagen_lionel wrote: »

My only problem with weapon types is you actually have to specialize in thier special functions.

In my opinion. the bleed from axe, sword bonus and armor penetration of Swords and maces should be with weapons by default, and specced points should further increase thier effectiveness.

Doesnt make much sense that you specialize in hammers and somehow you suddenly learn how to bash through things.

My second thing is thier effects should scale better, at least for axes. Hammers should always have that flat percentage bonus. Nothing should be a flat number with thier effects. Only thing that should be flat numbers with effects is enchantments.

It will make every weapon seem viable and have thier own appeal.

I disagree, it actually makes sense after spending points into a skill to get more proficient with a weapon.

Thats the thing though, thats not proficency, proficency is getting better with a weapon.

getting better doesnt mean a weapon suddenly begins doing things it was built to do by default.

A child with a hammer can smash a dent into the side of your car door just as easily as a grown man that tempers swords for a living only how much of an impact the two do is different.

The function of the weapon doesnt just suddenly activate cause you swung it around a few times. Proficency improves how well you use the weapon. An expert who has been using an axe in battle for years would be able to hack a limb of an enemy off with little difficulty than a new recruit just picking up an axe. He may not be able to hack an arm off, but that doesnt make the axe not an axe, he could still rend a target making them gush blood all the same, because its an axe, and not a stick that suddenly grows a large blade after flailing it around for a few months. May not be to the degree of the veteran. But that axe is still going to cause damage.

The weapons should do some kind of base function by default that only gets improved further by the skill points.

---

on the topic of the bleeds.

I do agree that its annoying that a weapon's base function becomes useless by not being able to make undead bleed. But it also makes sense.

Its not that bad of a thing though. There are alot of undead in this game. But there are plenty of opportunities to use your weapon for enemies that arent undead as there are plenty of them.

Its like being a dragon knight thats specced heavily in ardent flame and fighting a bunch of fire atronachs. Most of your attacks arent going to do much to them.

however, thats not much of a problem because there arent nearly as many enemies in the game thats fire atronachs or resistant to fire.

infact there arent many enemies with resistances at all compared to undead. Who have the most profound weakness to fire and fighter guild skill lines. But are immune to bleeds.

So that there is a dilemna. Axe users are in a pretty messed up state as many of the game's enemies and even whole quest areas are nothing but undead. And there arent other enemies that have profound resistances and immunities thats as profound.

In addition the bleed from axes are pretty low, and they are refreshed quite often, making thier actual ticks inconsistant.

In my opinion one of two things needs to happen,
1- The damage from the bleeds needs to scale to a percentage of the damage you deal, with the bleed that did the most damage being the most prodominate one that ticks and stays.

2- The bleeds remain as they are but they get a stacking debuff on the enemy that reaches a maximum stack. And only goes away once the first duration ends before another is applied.

Dharack

reagen_lionel wrote: »

Thats the thing though, thats not proficency, proficency is getting better with a weapon.

getting better doesnt mean a weapon suddenly begins doing things it was built to do by default.

A child with a hammer can smash a dent into the side of your car door just as easily as a grown man that tempers swords for a living only how much of an impact the two do is different.

The function of the weapon doesnt just suddenly activate cause you swung it around a few times. Proficency improves how well you use the weapon. An expert who has been using an axe in battle for years would be able to hack a limb of an enemy off with little difficulty than a new recruit just picking up an axe. He may not be able to hack an arm off, but that doesnt make the axe not an axe, he could still rend a target making them gush blood all the same, because its an axe, and not a stick that suddenly grows a large blade after flailing it around for a few months. May not be to the degree of the veteran. But that axe is still going to cause damage.

The weapons should do some kind of base function by default that only gets improved further by the skill points.

---

on the topic of the bleeds.

I do agree that its annoying that a weapon's base function becomes useless by not being able to make undead bleed. But it also makes sense.

Its not that bad of a thing though. There are alot of undead in this game. But there are plenty of opportunities to use your weapon for enemies that arent undead as there are plenty of them.

Its like being a dragon knight thats specced heavily in ardent flame and fighting a bunch of fire atronachs. Most of your attacks arent going to do much to them.

however, thats not much of a problem because there arent nearly as many enemies in the game thats fire atronachs or resistant to fire.

infact there arent many enemies with resistances at all compared to undead. Who have the most profound weakness to fire and fighter guild skill lines. But are immune to bleeds.

So that there is a dilemna. Axe users are in a pretty messed up state as many of the game's enemies and even whole quest areas are nothing but undead. And there arent other enemies that have profound resistances and immunities thats as profound.

In addition the bleed from axes are pretty low, and they are refreshed quite often, making thier actual ticks inconsistant.

In my opinion one of two things needs to happen,
1- The damage from the bleeds needs to scale to a percentage of the damage you deal, with the bleed that did the most damage being the most prodominate one that ticks and stays.

2- The bleeds remain as they are but they get a stacking debuff on the enemy that reaches a maximum stack. And only goes away once the first duration ends before another is applied.

Yes, getting proficient with a weapons means knowing how to handle it and eventually mastering to get to wield it to it's greatest effect, in this case it can mean the said bonuses. Remember you are not playing a game with very realistic physics or rulesets, so simply look at it that skilling it makes you so skilled that it's now actually impacting the game, very simple, for example knowing where to carve to cause the greatest wounds, knowing where to hit the enemy armor's weakest point, knowing how to swing a mace and use it's weight point to greatest effect etc, etc, the fluff that you can come up with is endless.

---

Yes, it is a problem, from a balance standpoint making one weapon less useful against enemy types makes the weapon unbalanced, if it doesn't outweights the others in it's effectiveness overall.

The comparison to fire dmg abilities not dealing much dmg to fire archons also is no viable argument, since you can very easily change abilities accordingly. On the other hand you can NOT change a passive, outside of completely changing weapons used, and even then immunities are stronger than resistances, even though it's a minor bleed it's the principle that's discussed.

Good that we agree on that point.

You should always let rulesets revolve around principles (approaching this from a background of tabletop games, where every single rule is very much thought through).

mousekime111rwb17_ESO

maybe change mace / maul passive to apply the concussion effect (% reduced damage by target) and make axes deal bigger critical damage.

Lynx7386

They should really just remove the dot from cleave and make it do additional damage, and change the passive bleed for 1h/2h axes to a critical damage bonus.

Nobody likes bleed effects.