I feel like this might be a sleeper weapon. The stat requirements are not the norm for big weapons, requiring strength and intellect. Find yourself a blunt facet, load it up with stagger damage increases, and this thing is a beast.
What makes it so great? Everything in the moveset has low recovery except the finishers. You can completely avoid the 3rd neutral attack, 2nd running attack, and 2nd dodge attack, always being able defend quickly with a dodge or parry. All 3 neutral attacks can be charged. An effective combo is not charging the first two attacks to set up a stagger, and then finishing by charging the finisher. The first two neutral attacks are all sweeping attacks, easily hitting multiple enemies, and with a short pause, you can avoid the finisher and continue cleaving. The running attack has great movement, being very solid for chase. Another good combo is doing two neutral attacks and then a running attack, essentially allowing a three hit combo with almost no recovery. You can even just spam the first running attack. The dodge attack is quick with low recovery, which makes it very useable against bosses, something many of the big slow weapons struggle with. You can turn the dodge attack into a two hit, low recovery combo, by following the first dodge attack with a running attack.
This thing is amazing. It would be nice if str int had more options for alternate two handers, but is totally worth it for this weapon. It also looks pretty darn cool.
Are you sure than the stagger can make a better value per second than plague swirl or stormpiercer with 1H weapon ?
Because 2H weapons have a great stagger value, but the slowness of theit attack make this stagger longer to happen and harder to reach than with a faster attacking weapon.
That’s also my main problem with 2H weapons. But your topic is really intersting, maybe I will change my mind when I’ll have enough embers to make a test on it.
If staggering quickly is your main goal, slapping front flip kick on this weapon helps a lot. It’s only 20 stamina, takes on the poise damage of whatever weapon it is on, is quick, and has decent range. I’ve been using it on bosses and they stagger in 3-4 hits. With gain 40 stamina and 15% health on stagger on plagued gloves, I get most of my stamina back and can immediately hit with a charged attack and then rune attack before boss comes back up. Wallbreaker is really strong with this. You can almost keep the boss perma-stunned.
With armor pen and physical damage enchants, this thing hits pretty hard too, especially fully charged. I tried plague focused staggering with the supporting enchants, but it didn’t keep up with poise damage gem and blunt facet for me. When I switched back to physical, it was immediately better for me. Having to drop either the facet or the gem made plague a little worse stagger wise, even with the 30% less stagger resistance for plagued enemies enchant. I’ve wanted to make plague work, but it never lived up to my expectations.
The thing is I already stagger boss in 2-3 hits with stormpiecer and a build based on stagger. And this rune attack is crazy fast and safe to use (mix of close and range and rush).
The main problem with stagger in endgame is that, with a good build, the boss die before to take the stagger and that sux
Thanks for the info anyway, I’ll test your setup asap !
Yeah I’ve been avoiding builds that rely heavily on rune attacks. I will not use battle cry ring or ring of determination. I feel like those builds are so powerful that the fight itself is almost completely missing. I still want a game to play, especially with how great the combat system is in this game.
