[zericosmic]

Of all the people to make a thread on monster spine, I betcha weren't expecting the axe gamer herself.

Monster spine is an incredibly fun weapon, it has so many fun things attached to it that it's quickly become one of my favorite weapons. (And Visceral Strike is just so damn satisfying)

However, it existing alongside bodyguard can become utterly silly, people are able to keep themselves in bodyguard range for multiple turns, making the weapon borderline oppressive on tank builds.

Maybe it's just me, but I think that the healing aspect of the weapon should be changed to be On Crit, rather than just hit, that way getting access to it's healing potential is reserved for builds that have to invest in to it, and it would make harder to invest in to being a tank.

It would also incentivize wearing something like Berserker Shell, (or Sarasha for all you wackos :>) rather than what's arguably the strongest chest piece in the game.

I think the fantasy of this weapon is that of a Barbarian or a Berserker, eschewing defense for a constant fury of attacks, and I feel like in it's current iteration, it is far more abusable as a tank.

[Rendar]

Of all the people to make a thread on monster spine, I betcha weren't expecting the axe gamer herself.

Monster spine is an incredibly fun weapon, it has so many fun things attached to it that it's quickly become one of my favorite weapons. (And Visceral Strike is just so damn satisfying)

However, it existing alongside bodyguard can become utterly silly, people are able to keep themselves in bodyguard range for multiple turns, making the weapon borderline oppressive on tank builds.

Maybe it's just me, but I think that the healing aspect of the weapon should be changed to be On Crit, rather than just hit, that way getting access to it's healing potential is reserved for builds that have to invest in to it, and it would make harder to invest in to being a tank.

It would also incentivize wearing something like Berserker Shell, (or Sarasha for all you wackos :>) rather than what's arguably the strongest chest piece in the game.

I think the fantasy of this weapon is that of a Barbarian or a Berserker, eschewing defense for a constant fury of attacks, and I feel like in it's current iteration, it is far more abusable as a tank.

Traitor.

Jokes aside, Monster Spine + Bodyguard is what I run and. Hollllly heck is Monster Spine the clutch here. Making it an On Crit would be.. interesting, but frankly. The HP healed from it shouldn't be based off of how much damage you take.

It instead should have the status be turned into Vampirism% = Level/2 that disappears on-hit. So I can stop smacking someone for 10 damage and healing for 100 hp because they did 200 damage to me.

[Autumn]

The healing on Monster Spine is an incredibly powerful HP buffer that effectively just adds +100 more EHP a round, if you're fighting someone with this, killing them in general without interference is really hard, I'd like to see this lowered to 50 LV max, it'd still be an incredible item even with that. Right now the weapon is actually just old Anchor Edge tier in efficiency, there are a few axes like this but often are held back by range or damage type to at least have suitable counters for.

I think it'd still be strong even after getting the healing adjusted, which is fine, new weapons should be strong for a little while, as long as repeats of Anchor Edge don't happen.

[Tana]

As Monster Spine is the dedicated Bloodborne weapon, with the health mechanic being an attempt at imitating the rally mechanic, I think it would do to take a look at the rally system in the first place.

In Bloodborne, you don't just instantly recover all the damage based on landing a single blow. It's instead limited by weapon, with slower weapons restoring more, sensibly enough. This can't be imitated reasonably in SL2, obviously.

What can be done, however, is to split it up. The point of the rally mechanic in Bloodborne is to encourage aggression, not defense - Given an ideal situation with basic hits, and not counting riposte hits or dual wielding, you can hit 3 times with basics. Make each basic hit you land cap out at somewhere between 25 and 33 hp restore max, with the status guaranteed to end after your turn so you can't rely on being able to 'make up' for what you don't trigger. You could even make it come with its own downside, like a lingering status effect that lowers your DRs or parry chances, like self-stagger. Might make it slightly 'stronger' as a dual wield option, but at that point you're either running innovator or main class rogue, which offers its own limits.

Numbers like the maximum stored rally amount can also be changed. Personally, I just like having range on an axe.

[Snake]

Eh. I'd rather the buildup of LV to be a little harder, or else the theme of the weapon goes buh-bye.

That power should definitely be shifted elsewhere, perhaps in Visceral Strike being the only way to proc the full LV HP heal, while other attacks or critical hits interact differently from the LV, perhaps drawing from the Blood Pool and reducing the LV appropriately.

[Shujin]

I think this is in part a problem because of Bodyguard being so oppressive in general, I think the idea to cap the healing per attack, would be the most faithful translation of the weapon, while also being still good, just forcing an even more offensive playstyle.

keep it like it is. cap the level at 100 still, But:
Per Hit- Heals 25 HP (or level if its lower)
Per Crit- Heals 50 HP (or level if its lower)

This will remove the "Hit heal for 100 and guard" situations or whatever other defensive shit people come up with during the window. It can't be lower than 2 turns duration because then you HAVE to be faster to even have a chance of benefitting from it.

I think that be fine for this weapon, and for the rest this weapon isn't really at fault and bodyguard should sooner take a hit.

[Poruku]

keep it like it is. cap the level at 100 still, But:
Per Hit- Heals 25 HP (or level if its lower)
Per Crit- Heals 50 HP (or level if its lower)

This sounds pretty good to me. Meaning builds that use it to consistently attack and crit will still get similar results, while tanks that use it to simply heal constantly will find it less useful

[FatherCrixius]

50 HP on a crit would make it only 3 - 5x stronger than pre-existing vampiric weapons, before any of the other Monster spine strengths are factored in. I like this weapon, I like it's theming; but it is undeniably power creeped in such a way that even with the provided nerfs in this thread it will continue to be the best basic hitting weapon in the game: regardless of class combo.

Denying people from just thwunking you into guard is nice and all, but that's not really where this weapon shines. 

If you can reduce your damage taken per round to around 200~, which is obviously very easy in a one on one, Monster spine as a use case provides an effective 50% DR. On top of it's very bloated base stats, weapon parts, and passives it isn't even competitive to find a replacement for this thing. This ignores the crit damage amped knockdown, reductions to parry effectiveness n hit, built in aoe's etcetera.

This wep is far better than anchor edge was, and even post suggested nerfs will continue to be so.

[Shujin]

there is no problem with a weapon to shine in an area, imo. Axes do good with some good competition in the weapon range and the weapon is fun.

And I doubt it will be "the best basic attack weapon" for it. I wouldn't even consider it the best axe in slot, up there, sure. But best? Doubt. It still has some conditionals, 50% DR is not exactly true either, and shouldn't be mistaken for it. Thats just when you look at it in a vacuum and assume you always get all the HP back. And you only get 200 damage a round.

I would monitor it for a while longer with the proposed changes, there is no need to over-nerf an actually fun-designed weapon.

[FatherCrixius]

you are trying to get me warning points