Are cleave OR greater cleave a waste?

[Flintsen]

Your opinions

[InfidelofHaLL]

Your opinions

not wanted so stay away!!!!!

[Flintsen]

Is that directed at me or my question?

[InfidelofHaLL]

Is that directed at me or my question?

your question silly read it all together

[Kraak]

yes it is a waste - until there are multiple high to hit mobs with low AC/low hp. I.e. if the Kobolds in Enter the Kobold actually did damage to you, then it might be worth it. And in retropect, it really doesn't seem to help the orthons in VOD too much either. ;)

[Griphon]

Eh..
I have both on my fighter because I ran out of Feats that I wanted.. and didn't want to 'just buy toughness' again...


I do have to say it's cheaper than Whirlwind... And gotta love when you get the rare times you get multiple vorpals off from a spin attack.

[gserlenga]

Not a waste imo, but it depends on your build, I wouldn't recommend it unless you have some extra feats from fighter levels, or are trying to qualify for the upcoming Barbarian PrE Frenzied Beserker. I have cleave on my barb14/fighter2 and in combo with a good intimidate score and stacking rages with a 2 handed weapon, it can really do a lot of quick damage and pull a lot of aggro. Just the other day in shroud did a double vorpal via cleave, which is cool to see. I love cleave.

[incontinetia]

I think it can be cool with blinding weapons or vorpal as another said, but it really depends on your build needing feats that may be more important. Most guys I know have swapped them out.

[Borror0]

Total waste, unless you have a Radiance II Scimitar. Then, it may be useful but only if you got nothing better.

[crmeyer]

I love Cleave and Greater cleave.

Cleaving is great fun ... WF Fighter has a great time with it.

Not just for the "special effects" (vorpal, etc. ... although that is cool) ... but major DPS on groups.

Might not be for everyone ... but I really enjoy it.

[Frodo_Lives]

At lower/mid levels cleave can be a ton of fun and it's quite useful. End game stuff not so much.

As others have said unless you have a ton of feats to spare there are usually better choices. As a pure fighter or almost pure fighter it may be worth picking up cleave.

[Trillea]

I could see someone having a lot of fun with it and a Radiance II falchion.

[Strakeln]

Very powerful tools when used properly.

[Canopenner]

I have a dwarven con fighter build that I just sheild block and cleave/great cleave with constantly. Works great. Not a waste in my oppinion.

[Justicesar]

I like them alot on my S&B and have both locked in just above the "W A S D" cluster. With the seperate timers I spam them as fast as they recharge....which resets my attack sequence, thus avoiding the slower attacks at the end.

[sephiroth1084]

Seems to me that the improvements being made to glancing blows will push these 2 feats further along the path to utter uselessness.

[Samadhi]

I like them, but then again I only have them on one melee, so it's certainly not the best thing there is.

[Eelpout]

I have them on my original S&B Paladin and they are definately useful, situationally. Good in a group of baddies to get quick aggro or for crowd control/special weapons. You can Paralyze several at a time. Nice with smite and disrupt as well, and if you get extremely lucky, vorpal is really fun.

[shoveljon]

Cleave was one of the original feats my human fighter took, and I took greater cleave asap. I loved them for flavour sake, for drawing aggro, and for just being able to cut a swathe in a crowd

HOWEVER

at higher level play, they're basically useless. Once that fighter started raiding, I swapped them out.

[Ranmaru2]

Great for vorpalling 4 mobs at a time (if you're lucky), or if dual wielding, then you can WoP/WoE everything around you in a 140 -180 degree arc. Only if used properly, as was said earlier are they useful.

[Big_Russ]

Great for vorpalling 4 mobs at a time (if you're lucky), or if dual wielding, then you can WoP/WoE everything around you in a 140 -180 degree arc. Only if used properly, as was said earlier are they useful.

Could be wrong, but I thought that only the weapon in your primary hand counted. Off hand does not do damage in a cleave or great cleave.

Edit:

Yes. Only primary hand in both cases. http://compendium.ddo.com/wiki/Feat:Cleave

[Garth_of_Sarlona]

Yes, Cleave has it's uses. If you have an affect such as destruction or shattermantle, or even just cursespewing, then entering a battle with a cleave can be useful.

Also, Cleave will attack your targets at your highest attack bonus i.e. the attack bonus of your final combo - which makes that 'first attack debuff' useful.

Garth

[geoffhanna]

My THF uses cleave and great cleave all the time. :)

My monk uses cleave all the time (didnt have enough feats to get great cleave too). :/

My TWF never uses it and no longer carries it. :(

[Vandos]

Excellent feats for an intimitank to take.

I intimidate a bunch of mobs, block then cleave with a cursespewer, switch to a destruction weapon and great cleave, on low will save mobs bust out a paralyzer and its an easy ride for the cleric.

Not at all the total waste some people claim them to be.

[secondchance]

Total waste, unless you have a Radiance II Scimitar. Then, it may be useful but only if you got nothing better.


this guy is just being silly


to the op ...... if you build around it then yes it is very viable

I have it on serveral different melee's

....on my itim tank (with a radience scimy) I find that it is very usefull itiim gathers them than I spam cleave and great cleave I hold argo they are also blind rogues wet themself's...lots of fun
...on my tactics fighter he has a triple earth weapon I like to spam cleave and great cleave earth grabs goes off a lot, and when argoed and the mods attack and hot him he also has a earthgrab and a freezing ice guard item it all works well together
.... on my 2 handed barb using cleave often w/ vorping, also when dps the cleave helps add to the spash damage of glacing blows...of course I also have earth grab guards on him as well

so for my 3 melee's that use it it works...but gear also plays into how effective it can be...and you better have decent ac or a ton of hp or a ton of guards to deal w/ the increased argo you might pull .....what I mean is you better have a plan ot deal w/ being hot my more than 2 or 3 mobs at a time ....if your toon can not stand up to that ....leave cleave alone

[Invalid_82]

Pretty much agree with the overall consensus:

It's primary advantage comes from weapons with effects and spreading it quickly over a group. For what its worth currently from like Gianthold on stat busting/special effects rule the day for most mobs (except red/purple). It is possible to effect multiple mobs with cleave/great cleave. What remains to be seen is how these feats interact with the new 2handed fighting system and secondary weapon procs which could make them less useful then ever or extremly useful.

As pointed out you will see barbs that want to become Frenzied Berserker taking this as a prereq for their PrE. As the new PrE gives FB Barbs the Supreme Cleave ability I would assume that these 2 feats interact well with the new 2handed fighting system but only time will tell.

As for my 2 handed wf barbarian I have respeced him to have the cleave feat to be ready for the PrE if it turns out to be effective. If it were not for that prereq I would not take the feat as I don't feel currently it is as valuable as other options out there.

[William_the_Bat]

I think a lot of people are missing an important point:

Cleave is FUN!

I like using it to slightly increase my damage output against multiple opponents, which is nice when soloing in the vale, or when you have a bunch of monsters bottled up in a doorway.

And as people have noted, the occasional multiple-vorpal is worth the price of admission.

Of course, if your build is feat-intensive, such as a TWF paladin or something, then it's probably not worth it. But if you can spare the feat, it's great fun to have!

[Ranmaru2]

It's awesome with Lightning Strike/(insert shroud proc here), as it's potentially a lot of damage dished out quickly. Theoretically, an intimitank in VoD with a good ac (about 63) could cleave/great cleave a lightning strike (it can be made with insight 4), shield block & intimidate, cleave again, block & intim, cleave, etc etc etc.

[Borror0]

shield block & intimidate
If you are talking about the Orthons, you're doing it wrong. Usually, they are dead before I even loose all my temporary hit points.

[krud]

I have one of those intimitanks with cleave/GC (edit - btw I'm referring to my s&b khopesh wielding intimitank). Frodo is right, it is useful through midlevels (i'd say thru gianthold), but after that, it loses it's effectiveness. I started speccing them out.

The weapons that work very well with cleave/GC just aren't effective anymore at cap (paralyzers, curspewers, disruptors, etc), and enough people are wearing the BP of destruction that cleaving for the AC destruct isn't really necessary anymore. Hit procs, such as my earth grab khopesh, don't go off any more often with cleave than when I just swing freely.

When intimidating, I find it better to just turtle up and let everyone else dish out damage. Anything I can deliver with cleave/GC pales in comparison to what the other party members are doing. If I don't need to turtle while inimidating, I seem to be more effective if I just attacking normally. When I get the paladin spell zeal, then it's only going get better to attck normally compared to cleaving.

For my radiance wielding rogue (who had cleave in an earlier incarnation) I find it easier to just run around swinging and tabbing thru the mobs to get them all blinded (or whatever effect you are after), rather than trying to cleave.

edit - when is it effective? If you run with a slower group that isn't always buffed to the max or uber equipped out of this world, then it can remain a very good tactic. You can spam intimidate/cleave/gc a bunch of times while the rest of the group helps out. In zerg groups and most raids, things are long dead before your cleaves have any great effect, or add any real value.

[vyvy3369]

There are a couple other benefits to Cleave/Great Cleave that haven't been mentioned yet.

Particularly when using a one-handed weapon, your reach is increased significantly (you can hit things normally out of range of your weapon), so you're potentially hitting opponents that you otherwise couldn't or getting an attack off before you're actually in range for a regular attack.

They ignore attack chain cooldowns. For example after using intimidate, switching weapons, etc. you usually receive a short delay before you can attack again. During that time you can still use Cleave/Great Cleave though, so you're dishing out damage when you otherwise couldn't make attacks.

The other thing to keep in mind is that they have different animation speeds depending on which attack style you're using - S&B seems to be fairly quick, anything else uses the slower one that isn't as useful.

I use both of them quite frequently on my S&B Fighter, but couldn't fit them in on my TWF (soon-to-be) Kensai and I do miss them on occasion (particularly when using an Action Boost or Intimidate).

[Ranmaru2]

If you are talking about the Orthons, you're doing it wrong. Usually, they are dead before I even loose all my temporary hit points.

It was used an example. I've been in low dps VoDs and in high DPS VoDs and can vouch for the outcome of what you say happened in your example, but not all intimitanks have a super high ac. Some shield block with mega-guard/shroud item damage.

It's really easy to get the ac to not get hit much by them.

[Borror0]

[...] but not all intimitanks have a super high ac.
Well, you spoke about 63 AC.

[Ranmaru2]

Well, you spoke about 63 AC.

and? most intimitanks are under the impression that turtling under a shield is what they should be doing if they have an awesome AC, which makes no sense.

[Borror0]

most intimitanks are under the impression that turtling under a shield is what they should be doing if they have an awesome AC, which makes no sense.
I know since that was my point. I am now lost to what yours is, now.

[Ranmaru2]

I know since that was my point. I am now lost to what yours is, now.

My point was, that although you happen to do it differently, a vast majority do it the turtle-might-as-well-be-a-strength-rogue-with-a-shield method, and offering up an alternative strategy that would help you keep aggro and not have to intimidate as often if you get some lightning strikes off would be something to consider.

[Borror0]

My point was, that although you happen to do it differently, a vast majority do it the turtle-might-as-well-be-a-strength-rogue-with-a-shield method, and offering up an alternative strategy that would help you keep aggro and not have to intimidate as often if you get some lightning strikes off would be something to consider.
Why not just teach them to do it correctly?

[Hobgoblin]

this game is a waste

[Ranmaru2]

Why not just teach them to do it correctly?

idk, I try, but trying to tell other people how to play a game rarely works out. And there's only really a few intimitanks I know who could actually do this...In the end you can't teach the willfully ignorant, even you can agree with that