To explain my line of reasoning, it's publicly accepted across the community that the 2-Handed Choppa playstyle is woefully underdeveloped and underused, and no one envies the Choppa for being 'cursed' with its circumstance. The "Path o' Da Hitta", is simply unappreciated, while those (like myself, an rr70+ Choppa player) struggle to make it function beyond anything other than a reskinned, un-stealthable Witch Elf that's slower and bulkier in design. After exploring the design of Da Hitta spec, reviewing the past iterations of the specialization and discussing amongst multiple players regarding their experiences, I have come up with some ideas on how this specialization could be overhauled while maintaining a balanced design. But first let's review the basics.
To address some potential questions:
1. What are the flaws?
2. Is the specialization fulfilling its purpose?
3. What would you suggest should be done to rebalance this mastery?
1: The flaws the Mastery Specialization does not fulfill any of it's proposed mechanics (like high crit-damage-bursting), except on a subpar level. It has a low damage-burst rate due to the weapons attack speed and lack of synergy, it's riddled with Tactic's that no one uses as they do not present any useful mechanics to the meta or even existing outside of meta, regardless. And last but not least important, is the skills provided are mediocre at best and do not fulfill any synergetic roles to the spec in question. I will provide further details below.
The flaws with "Da Hitta" Spec are simply obviously but intensely crippling as of the current situation: The abilities do not do enough damage to even out the flow of combat, hitting too slowly while being easily parried by other class abilities, providing no recourse except being countered with little ease. A single-target melee class should be excelling at its singular role, holding its own at the very least in very tricky situations; The Hitta spec can't even do that. "Chop Til' You Drop", is a motto of the two-handed Choppa they live and die by, of which this spec has been ignoring. Another issue is the apparent lack of usefulness for the specialty, as no one relies on a Choppa for "anti-healing mechanics", those are left to RDPS classes, or the occasional tank. A Choppa's purpose is to deal damage, quickly and ruthlessly. Debuffing the enemy he faces in combat should be the primary focus, not "offhand heal debuffing", which is an irrelevant function as his damage output should be more than enough to even the odds and render healing nothing but delaying the inevitable. And if it is a class that doesn't heal then it's instead, simply, a useless effect. While incoming healing and outgoing healing are important things to pay attention to, they are not of any concern to the Choppa. His damage should be the wrench in the gear-spokes, the primary function, not focusing on a situationally small debuff. No healer will ever go solo wandering unless they're fully endgame geared, Renown Rank 80 at least, and even then rarely venture out on their own. The idea of debuffing healers shouldn't be a Choppa's focus, and frankly never will be.
2: Is the specialization fulfilling its intended purpose? Simply put: No. It has no purpose. The spec is rendered into irrelevancy because literally everything else a Choppa can do is outperforming it in terms of damage composition, chance of surviving while using said spec and the sheer fact it's simply focusing on trying to kill a single target, which is a useless means to commit to as outside of PVE or SC's, of which 80% of this video-game's primary content focus is Realm VS Realm combat, ala Warband VS Warband, Keep/Fort/City Sieges and even small-scale ORVR pvp (which a Hitta Choppa may get a few lucky kills if the opposing WS isn't paying attention or literally doesn't care and lets the BW pop you like a charred grape). A Choppa whose primary focus is one target at a time should therefore be killing his targets relatively quickly in order to maintain synergy with the combat's ebb and flow, and Da Hitta Choppa has been failing to do that for quite some time. Its of no surprise to anyone that people shun players who use this mastery and refuse to have others participate unless they respecialize with another mastery spec, otherwise they are told to hit the road. I myself have endured that kind of behaviour, and it is unappreciated but I understand why. It's partly the reason I've made this thread, but not the primary one.
3: The real main issue, is the Choppa Mastery Specialization of "Da Hitta" excels at nothing and provides no benefits to be used. Literally, it's as if this spec was designed as an after-thought someone didn't have the care to maintain or felt it was worth mentioning unless out of sheer boredom, and that is the epitome of bad design. The fact is that a Single Target Choppa should be doing what any blood-minded single berserk brute is meant to do: Violently assault the first thing it see's in a tunnel-vision-driven rage and "go full TF2 Soldier giving a inspiring speech about Sun-Tzu." Referential-jokes aside, the issues are plain and obvious to see: No burst damage, no means of viable sustained damage without immense risk-taking thus a unfair-tradeoff, and failing to fulfill it's intended purpose: To break skulls.
First, let's cover pre-existing abilities that require some "adjustments". I will give some insight and suggestions of the subject.
1. Reckless Blow - Ability, Exhaustive Blow (75% Damage Boost if Enraged, 50% if Berserk). "Wildly Chop at your enemy for X Amount of Damage." That's it, I have to admit that while this is less distressing than the previous version, which increased your chance of being Critically Hit for 5% for 5 seconds and give nothing in return....I think we can do better than that. At least give it some utility to provide, as frankly it does nothing to make it preferable to spamming Slasha which is practically your standard M1 ability. 30 points of more damage isn't impressive.
Here is my revised version: Reckless Blow Adjustment - "Wildly Chop at your enemy for X Amount of Damage, increasing your damage by 5% if Enraged, or 10% if Berserk. Your chance to be critically hit will be increased by 5% chance or 10% chance for 5 seconds, respectively." A fair, rational tradeoff that gives risk and reward evenly, thus breathing new life into this ability and overall, improving reliability. The AP cost should remain the same roughly.
2. Bleed Em' Out - Ability. "Cause your target to take X amount of Damage, increasing over time as the counter ticks down." Simple ability, love it, but it's wasted being in the talent tree at all, it should be a standard ability acquired via leveling. There are a few ranks during while leveling where Choppa acquires no abilites (I am fairly confident it's in the late 20's to 30's), I am sure it could fill a spot in one of those listings. Any specialization can and will use it if they please to, there's no point to having it hog a worthwhile slot. A reduction from 45 to 25 AP also would be reasonable, as it makes no sense why a level 5 Mastery Skill is consuming so much AP.
In response to giving a free Skill Tree Slot, this ability I would like to introduce the replacement Path o' Da Hitta Buff Ability: Bloody Butcher - Increase your chance to crit by 5%, stacking to 3x whenever you critically hit a target, for 15s. 60AP Cost, Cool Down: 30 Seconds. Simple, effective and fun while to the point, as Da Hitta spec should be.
3. As I had mentioned previously, the Choppa spec for Da Hitta is woefully lacking in purpose, but make no mistake, it's use of anti-healing curses is wasted on the class and in turn, hinders it rather than help. For Da Savage spec, I would like to introduce a conceptual skill to be used in it's place, and have Cant Stop Da Chop removed entirely, as it serves no real benefit. That suggestion would be:Level 10 Path o' Da Savage Ability - Reckless Cleave, Ability: Brutally smash your blade against the target's ribs, inflicting X damage while reducing their chance to parry by 10% for 10 seconds. 25AP cost, 5s cd. This would improve a Choppa's chance to survive and duel another melee class, while replacing their anti-healing attack to even the odds while allowing them to focus on their real purpose: To deal damage in melee combat.
4. And last but not least, to give Da Hitta a proper endgame ability that people will actually appreciate, much more so use, is my conceptual Level 15 Path o' Da Hitta Ability - Maul'er - Ability, Exhaustive Blow, Berserk Only: You butcher the target in a crazed rage, hitting twice for 550 damage. 45 AP Cost, 15sec CD. Simple, brutal, will hit effectively and be satisfying in animation ala I'd recommend using the attack animation from Extra Choppin', just with fewer but wider red slashes appearing across the target with the sound of blood splattering off the target, think Dark Souls. Of course like any standard skill it can be defended against, etc.
That's all I have to say about Da Hitta abilities, the Sit Down! and Hittin' Time abilities are perfect and require no revising, whereas the Mastery Tree tactics for Da Hitta spec, I am not sure of what to suggest. I am not familiar with how the devs design the ideas behind tactics, therefore I don't want to overstep any boundaries in misunderstanding. However, I have a few ideas for adjustments:
- In regards to the most obvious one, Strong Finish, rolling back to increasing your chance to hit with a 2-handed weapon by 15%, but decreasing your chance to parry by 10% is acceptable. This gives all abilities a fair chance to be viable, and will prevent from spamming Da Hitta abilities relentlessly.
- In regards to Long Lasta, I'd recommend revising the effect slightly, such as: "On a 5% chance per hit, prevent any AP loss for the next 6 seconds." The current effect of losing no AP if one of your exhaustive blows are defended, is a very weak skill and forces you to essentially attack tanks. No one who is using a 2-Handed weapon outside of duels or inappropriately focusing on said character in SC's will do this, therefore it is a worthless tactic until revised otherwise. And weapon-effects regarding AP loss supersede this tactic as it stands, regardless.
- In regards to Pent-Up-Rage, I would suggest either overhauling it, or scrapping it and designing a different tactic. "Wot Rules?" is far better, a beloved Tactic, and removes any need to use this one as the uses of synergy surpass it effectively. It's a wasted tactic slot. If I was to make a suggestion, something that benefits withholding rage while giving combat buffs and debuffs respectively for doing so. Therefore giving you an option to play for high rewards while approaching high risk, evenly.
The end-line 'Da Hitta' M4 Ability is fine as is, a far more useful (and that's saying something) than the anti-healing abilities provided to us as of right now, but as no one ever uses M4 abilities past the standard M4 we get at 40, it doesn't matter.
And that is my feedback on the abilities of the Mastery Specialization for "Da Hitta". In regards to gameplay combat improvements, the weapon itself, the 2-Handed Axe, is a fine weapon. But if it could use a buff to make up for its slow speed? I'd suggest giving it a higher chance to critically hit, by around 10%, more so than the standard 1-Handed weapons at any rate. While having a Parry breakthrough "buff" is acceptable, sadly it's ultimately useless in many situations. Especially with abilities that bypass parry defenses and make the entire system irrelevant as a result.
Thank you for reading my post, if you have any questions please feel free to ask me, I hope the dev team will see my post and consider my feedback with interest. Cheers!
