Warhammer : Choppa Preview

by Seyon, in Games: Warhammer Online (1 Comment)

As we devour over Warhammer Online patch 1.2 in all of its gooey goodness, I thought I would do a quick write up on the Choppas.

Mechanic

The Choppa mechanic is rage and rage is built over time. For every one second that you are in battle you gain five rage, to the maximum of 100 rage. There are three stages of rage; normal, furious and berserk. Normal (0-24 rage) has no bonuses or penalties. Furious (25-74 rage) has +25% bonus damage and no penalties. Berserk (75-100 rage) has +50% bonus damage but also has the penalty of armor and resistances reduced 50%.

Exhaustive Blows

Exhaustive blows (EB) drain your rage while often giving you a benefit. EBs are special attacks that can give +75% bonus damage for that attack if certain conditions are met. Most EBs used while in Berserk mode will not give the bonus damage but will drain rage, while other EBs require you to be in Berserk mode.

Masteries

Path of Da’ Savage
“A mastery path focused on longer-duration battles.”
There are no weapon requirements for this path, meaning you can dual wield or use a two-hander. This path has two EBs, one that gives you 100 Action points, “Keep on Choppin’,” and another that reduces your target’s crit chance to 0% for ten seconds, “Try and Hurt Me.” There is also a channeled attack, “Furious Choppin’,” for a single target that heals you for what it damages. Finally, the main Choppa attack, “Can’t Stop the Chop,” is in this path, an attack that debuffs armor.

Path of Da’ Hitta
“A mastery path focused on dealing quick, exhaustive blows.”
A two-handed weapon is a requirement for this path. Two of the EBs seem more PvP friendly with “Tired Already” increasing the cooldowns for your target and “No More Helpin’,” reducing healing on your target by 50%. “Bleed ‘Em Out” is a ten second DOT where each tick of damage increases over time.

Path of Da’ Wrecka
“A mastery path focused on area of effect offensive abilities.”
This is the path for the dual wielding AoE lovers among us. “Chop Fasta” is a group buff that reduces cooldowns for the group every time you are hit during its duration. “Bring it On” is a channeled self-buff that deals damage every time you are hit. And yes, there is skill called “Git to Da’ Choppa” which not only is a channeled AoE attack but also pulls one random enemy toward you.

I think Path of Da’ Wrecka will be popular come the Choppa release, but keep in mind that I have been terribly wrong on these guesses before. I see strengths in each path and, all told, the class looks like a riot to play.