It’s a shame that Vestal suffers from the same problems that she had in DD1, a rather boring support style where the best skills are not super fun to use, and any creative paths or builds are just so weak that they’re not worth it. I do think the addition of consecrations was a great idea, and having moves power up with conviction tokens is also good, but vestal really needs access to some more diverse paths. If hellion can either be a one shot nuke or an unkillable tank that does no dmg, vestal should be able to have better paths than “Support, Support with debuffs, Support with buffs, and Support but worse”
like im literally just finished grandslam with vestal and flagellant that sometimes use specifically the move he trashes. heck hand of light confessor vestal is really good with scroll of profane, you can weakened AND taunt, just dont get shuffled
@_Aidelweiss_ as a Vestal enjoyer I'm gonna say you can grandslam with any team. Especially if that team has Flag in it. Dude carries runs by himself. Every move has some use and can be useful, but it doesn't change the fact that Vestal is arguably the worst character by a mile!
Not to forget that Illumination is literally worse than Highwayman's Tracking Shot because the only difference between the two moves is that Tracking Shot sets up Combo. That's it.
When vestal first came out in early access, it seemed like the community loved her, and that was probably just because we were so starved for a dedicated new hero. I never felt good playing her. I felt like she was a liability, always losing her at the mountain boss.
Yea she is a deadweight. Since she is so slow the buffs are never impactful on the most important round. Compare to occultist who can remove block/dodge and give debuffs. Move something out of position, nuke something out of orbit. Or get decent heals at 50% health threshold. Everytime i bring vestal I always end up asking" why didn’t i bring Occultist?".
Only took 6+ months for the community to realize how bad she was on release. Part of the reason she is still in a horrendous state is that ANY sort of criticism of her many flaws was suffocated by fanboys.
Whoever decided that divine light and divine grace need some health threshold and cooldown without any way of buffing the healing was insane. Main thing that made Vestal so good in DD was how she could outheal damage monsters like Countess, Sleeper, Vvulf or Swine King. Imagine having same healing in DD2 in DD1, you would not be able to beat Necromancer or even Brigand Pounder.
@@John-uw2je Not only that, cures DoTs, can remove negative buffs and turn them to heal, her healing can get buffed without much hassle and has path which can buff it even more.
@@bourhinorc1421 True, thats why I used Sleeper as an example, it can reliably put your entire team on death door and Vestal can save them all (plus her camping skill even can recover them with insane health and stress if they have DD debuff). Now imagine DD2 Vestal against Sleeper lol.
Great analysis and I agree with everything. But saying things like "red hook in their infinite wisdom" is a huge turn off. They are immensely talented and work their asses off and they are giving you something to yap about.
Bad path idea that might be fun: make something based around always having no conviction. Kinda like occultist’s unchecked power, having Conviction at the start of her turn would apply debuffs, burn away positive tokens, or the like, but starting your turn with 0 conviction would give you 3. Make her moves not necessarily spend all the conviction at once, like the Bishops in the tangle, but get a big power boost whenever they’re used, flip the whole mechanic on its head. Give vestal some wacky paths that aren’t just “put her in X rank.”
@@fitzviandraduivenab2790 runaway in general is so ass sadly, controled burn carries boss encounters but outside of that she is kinda a constant weight that does too little damage and has very situational skills. The only way to make her good is to build a party around her situational skills (bleed healing, marking skill, frontline shuffle), which tbh is not worth it.
i havent played dd2 in so long that all of this sounds like its in another language but i still listened to every one of r4nger's velvet words mesmerized for the whole 15 minutes 69/10 would listen to more R4nger RantsTM
I like Vestal's low power, I think all she needs is better rank flexibility. She has so many paths and kit combinations that don't work just because one or two abilities that would make her good or well rounded can't be used on a given rank. Give Confessor Judgment and Illumination useable at all ranks; BAM, you have a viable cc token control frontliner with block, guard, token removal and a bit of reach. Chaplain is too vulnerable to stress to be a good tank. Make her Mace Bash 2 pips +100% damage, 3 pips reduce her stress by -1 and adjacent ally -1. Then let Divine Comfort and Ministrations be useable in rank 1 and 2 respectively.
I would disagree, hand of light is so horrible it’s not even funny. Every move is supposed to have usability, otherwise people will just ignore it. Buffing other moves just to overshadow already bad moves helps no one. Also, poor rank flexibility is supposed to be her weakness, same as the Leper.
Powercrept by characters that came out two years before she did. That stings a certain kind of way. She is really the only character I want to see reworked as her one decent path you just name her token bot.
Very fun video! I enjoyed watching and it made me laugh. Vestal's kit is one I find very cool in concept. It's a kit that (I think, I dont actually know if this is the reason red hook designed it this way) has some pretty meh skills but they're mostly to wait for her conviction to build up so she can use a very powerful skill. However it ends up feeling like she builds up so she can use a very skill. Her kit feels pretty bad I think because when you're doing well she isn't doing much and when you're doing poorly her conviction moves don't do enough to turn the tables in your favor.
going confessor regen-hand-nuclear bonk that ignores block and dodge is actually very fun. The rest is not, don't even equip other skills so you can forget they exist. Also i always though i was doing something wrong not getting any value out of her. Good thing i'm not alone on this
one more thing about chaplain is that she doesn't get benefit from dodging the skill. there are skills like benefit from getting hit like leper's ruin. but that only one skill and it also counts dot.
I think Wanderer Mantra is actually okay-ish. It's based off her concecrations, which are the only reason to bring her anyways, and heals with no cooldown and no threshold. Not much healing, not reliable healing when you need it, but SOME healing on two targets to help mitigate the gradual attrition taken by frontliners. The tricky thing about it is that you probably have about a 50/50 chance of Vestal actually having a turn 3 to use on it. It's outclassed by the Seraph version, but so is everything.
I tried running chaplain vestal with MAA and templar cruzader (just to have a consistent healer), and still was a struggleto get value in mantra, in an entire run I got maybe 1 or 2 valuable uses of chaplain mantra, in her own this moves suck
Vestal and Leper comprise my least-run and least-favorite characters in DD2. The amount of work you need to put in to make them even playable outstrips any degree of fun I might get out of them.
Yeah, but at least lepper rewards said work, while vestal just goes from bad to mediocre. And with leper you can use runaway, crusader, duelist, occultist, jester, man-at-arms and even highwayman, because any of them like to put combo tokens to the front, or have a reliable way of healing/ignoring blind. But with vestal, I usually need to build a team around her needs, even though she is supposed to be a support!
@@FatWalterWhite69 Hey dude, you left some comment regarding travel heal in my original comment on this video, it got deleted, I didnt have time to read it in time (idk why), could you write here again what was in that reply? thx.
@@FatWalterWhite69 I think tempest leper damage is fine. Would even say it's bit on the higher side. I wish the poe support was more rank flexible. Since his whole stick tanking. Have no reasone to take wanderer leper though. Since tempest and poet gives huge stat buffs on damage or tanking.
All Leper really needs is his low roll damage bumped up a bit to make him less reliant on crit, landing a swing with him for 6 damage feels like shit, bump him up to 7 or 8 and I think he'd be perfect.
Just to preface this, Vestal still sucks, but you are going way overboard on how bad she is. 1/2 "Vestal loses access to her best moves and this is why you should never play her in front". Literally no. You lose Grace, but not really since Vestal really likes dance teams. Like a LOT. This allows her to swap between frontline/backline when played correctly. It takes an insane amount of management and specific teambuilding for a payoff other heroes just get for free, which is why she's really shit right now, but saying "Vestal sucks in front and should never be played there" is wrong. "HoL on Wanderer is one of the worst skills in the game". Disagree. 1-3 reach with some damage makes it an okayish token clear and is your only offensive option as frontline Vestal, since Bonk will consume your conviction before you get crit and want to pop Max Grace. It's the safer option and provides a solid bit of extra survivability with the Block. It's a solid Mastery, since if you Master it Vestal starts shitting out Strenght like no other hero. "HoL is not good bc Consecrations generate tokens better" Yes, but are you pressing Consecrations literally every turn? No. With every path you have to take at minimum 1 action between Consecration uses and for frontline Wanderer Vestal this is her best option since Bonk sets you back 2 turns on Max Grace, Comfort/Sanctuary can be a bit too slow at times, Illu sometimes does literally nothing and you don't always need to press your recovery buttons. It's your best offensive filler move and prolly what you equip alongside Consecration/Heal/util when you play Vestal in a midrange dancy type of role. You are also talking about the Consecrations as if you run both at all times. You rarely do this since very often you want to do something other than "press slow Defensive Consecration" turn 2, so I find only having Light for most fights is better. "Sanctuary is better defensive utility than HoL" True, but you are simply ignoring the token clear aspect of HoL. You can clear Block with it from Ranks 1-3, which is a lot more useful than you give it credit for. "You don't want Strenght on Vestal bc other frontliners deal more dmg than Max Bonk anyways" True, this is why I never run Bonk. It can pop off bc you can set yourself up very easily (especially on Seraph), bc +100% dmg Strenght Block Dodge Pierce hits for 18-24 which is pretty nuts. Is it worth the setup and building around? No, but you can very easily just get full Bonk just by existing (especially on Seraph), so if you have the space it's a decent play to go for it. "HoL barely changes on paths" True, bc you did mention Confessor HoL. Chaplain is trolldespair in literally every aspect so not worth talking about, Seraph doesn't change it, which is prolly good since it's actually even better there. You really need that offensive filler between Light refreshes, since you have 4 empty actions instead of 2 like the other paths. "Confessor HoL gets powercrept by Yawp" This man does not value token clear lmao. "Illu on Wanderer isn't terrible" What is this man on. This move sucks 90% of the time and is only really good for Act 4, but then you just pick Confessor. This is completely dead 90% of the time, since your turn 1 is almost always a Consecration and Vestal isn't fast enough to outspeed most Stealth enemies before they lose Stealth next turn anyways. The Dodge clear is cool, but Combat item --> literally any other move is both more value and still clears 2 Dodge. And don't forget you prolly press this move from turn 2 onwards, so most enemies likely don't have a whole lot of Dodge anymore. HoL provides almost the same reach, but gives more Token clearing for Block, chip damage on hit and defensive setup for Vestal and sets up others when Mastered. The Mastery on Wanderer Illu is absolute cope, enemies rarely generate Dodge and you can very often do this thing called "killing them" instead. Or just throw combat items. Your ass is not using those 10 inv slots worth of throwable combat items anyways so might as well use them as dodge clears. You just always have a better option available that actually gives value when you hit through Dodge with Vestal. Judgement does damage and I already explained HoL.
2/2 "Illu on Confessor" Yeah. This is true. I just don't run it that much tbh. Its good if you know the enemies coming up generate annoying positive tokens, but against most normal fights it's like a 50:50 on if it does literally anything. Vestals space is already limited, so this kinda falls out of the kit for me pretty often. Sure clearing that crit token is nice, but you probably know when an enemy that generates lotsa crit is coming up. And for raw token clearing, HoL+ is just better. "Searing Strike > Judgement" Surely Leper reach isn't an issue for Searing Strike, so clearly bc it deals more damage it is a better move :clueless:. Yeah this is not an argument. This argument is flawed on a basic level since it's basically the equivalent of "Hounds Rush is worse than Collect Bounty bc less damage". Actual cope statement. Omnireach is an incredible tool and someone who has limited move space like Vestal can't afford to run multiple reach options, so being able to target any Rank with Judgement is actually pretty good. "Which you generate by tanking hits with Chaplain" HUH?????? WHAT?????? Is this supposed to be Chaplain only? Are we just ignoring Seraph???? Wanderer???? Like the actually good paths???? Can I say "Plague Grenade sucks bc Surgeon cuts the Blight chance so clearly it must be a shit move" now. Is this where we are at. On Judgement: Yeah it's still not great. Backline Vestal runs it bc it's your only offensive option, but it's still shit bc it eats your conviction which you'd rather use on Heals to make them heal actually good numbers. Removing the entire conviction effects is probably a buff tbh bc it gives backline Vestal an option to press that's guaranteed value without sacrificing your future heals. Right now it's your tool for "I know I can gerenate like 2 conviction" or "I only have 1 Conviction so it's fine to press". Confessor Judgement: Literally never run this this thing sucks for all the reasons stated in the vid. Play Vestal in front and save up Conviction for Mantra/Grace instead. This move being this shit is literally the reason why Confessor Vestal is only good on Dance teams bc your backline kit is literally nonexistant. Everything with Grace: This man is actually spitting straight facts. Make the Healing Treshhold change with Conviction would be my fix, but eh. You run this bc otherwise Vestal is a hardsupport without any offense/recovery. Dance her back and bank all your conviction and pray to god you get to use this. The Healing output is actually pretty good, you are literally getting a Flag self-heal on anyone when you pop Max Grace, but very often your hero just explodes before you get the turn to press this. This is why Vestal really only works on hyper-aggro Dance teams, since unless you kill 2-3 enemies quickly with the Strenght Tokens she provides, Grace can't outheal even 2 enemies focusing without any backup plan or hope for the next heal to come around. Also the reason Seraph is so much better than the other paths, since it's the only one that can generate Max Grace before to comes off cooldown. (Chaplain is not a path) Fortitude is good exlusively on Seraph for longer fights bc it's a slow non-offense option you press on turn 2. Just use Light or any other move. Vestal likes hyper-offense, so a defensive buff is...not exactly great. It's good for longer fights bc you can hope that the amazing defense Fortitude+ generates is enough to keep your team going before the Boss damage catches up to you. Playing for the long game with Vestal is...not advisable, since Grace is...well shit for any fight longer than like 3 turns. Ministrations is just as niche as Fortitude bc you equip it for fights with big DoT or Stun and literally never else. It takes up a slot and needs you to dance back or play cope backline Vestal. Vestal likes hyper-offense so much that you can very often just ignore DoT's altogether, since most of the time you end the fight before they can tick more than once. Too clunky and doesn't favor Vestal's preferred playstyle for fights where removing Stun isn't something you plan for. "Mace Bash is actually good on Chaplain" Your first mistake is picking Chaplain. Seraph generates more Conviction consistently on teams that allow Vestal to actually use her better offensive frontline moves without losing her backline utility moves. Seraph also gets incredible Max Bonk setups with specific teams: Jester Hwm Vestal Gr for example gets a guaranteed fullbonk with Strenght on turn 2, since you can do Solo, Light Rank 1, Repartee turn 1, into Hwm Vestal Gr Jester positions with Speed on Jester. Then you have Strenght Finale (1) --> Strenght Pirouette (2) --> Strenght Bonk (3) on turn 2. Is this worth going for? Usually not, since Hwm + Pirouette is enough to kill most Rank 1/2 enemies, but it's really good into bigger frontline enemies, like every size 2 enemy or Boss in the frontline. This is the type of team that favors Vestal, since you put out insane damage very quickly on heroes that can't get Strenght very easily with mutliple ways to move Vestal back to heal with Grace. It also allows her to use her fairly big HP pool and defensive abilities with HoL/Sanctuary, since Nightsworn Repartee allows her to Taunt. 90% of the time you'd much rather press Doolest --> Comfort or HoL to finish off something left over by Hwm + Gr dmg. Sanctuary: Why are we talking about Chaplain like it's an actual path again? Sanctuary is good bc it's a defensive tool that's more flexible than the rest of her kit. It pairs very well with the fragile nature of Dance teams, since most of the big dancers (Gr and Jester) are fairly frail and like to be guarded. Very good move. Don't master this it's just baiting your greed. HoL+, Mantra+ and Grace+ are right there. Light: Yeah this is the move you build around. This is why you want dance teams. Just to multiproc Light. And it's the reason why Seraph is her best path. Getting full Conviction turn 2 is really good. Comfort is a cope move. Like this man is spitting here. You don't have space for a move that generates zero (0) offensive tempo on a hero that needs to throw the entire team into full offensive tempo generation mode to work. Literally just don't. If you find Icon of Light upgrade this and put her into Rank 4 and maybe you can get some semblance of value from this. Mantra: Wanderer Mantra sucks. You do not have Mastery for a move that needs 3 turns to come online. Fight is literally over at that point if you play Vestal on a team built around her strenghts. Same with Confessor. Chaplain is not a path. Seraph likes Mantra and even kinda wants to upgrade it, (now bear with me) AT THE FIRST INN, bc it allows you to basically do stalling from DD1. No Treshhold Healing? Satisfactory. You press this at the end of combat when your Consecrations are not gonna generate any value anyways for a very big heal on two people. Later on this is your cope that you can survive until Turn 4 to pop it before your Consecrations disappear to keep your team going against Act Bosses. I should prolly explain my hate for Chaplain huh. So: Chaplain is a straight nerf to: Conviction generation, HoL, Mantra. It changes Sanctuary, but this is prolly a nerf too. Conviction is insanely inconsistent, since you have to hope you get hit. This assumes you do not apply any Dodge or Blind at all. Then you get a 25% to generate 1 conviction from enemies attacking. Enemies don't always attack. If you use a full turn to generate guard, you instead get a 50% to generate one per enemy attack. This also has anti-synergy with Vestal's entire gameplan of "KILL KILL KILL QUICKLY KILL I CANNOT HEAL MORE THAN ONCE KILL KILL KILL" since you need to leave enemies alive. Confessor and Wanderer are consistant and Seraph has insane Conviction generation. Just don't. You are not spending braincells building around this gimmick. Every other path offers the same payoff for Conviction anyways. HoL sucks. Strenght > Block. Also deals less dmg. You need to kill people. Turtling is gonna expose Vestals weakness of having one-time use heals. Mantra sucks for all the reasons in the vid. You need other heroes to get any semblance of value and it makes your heal inconsistent in the way that enemies can say "Nuh uh" and target the Guarded hero to remove the entire Guard. Sanctuary only changes on Mastery (you don't Master this). Even when you Master it, it's just 1 Block+ and 1 extra attack. If this is enough to give up the Conviction vomiting Seraph does or the consistency/plannability of Wanderer/Confessor, sure. See this as the only bright spot. I will consider you clinically insane, but sure. Go ahead.
The criticism is on point, but the devs are people too. If they don't dare to make mistakes to learn from, they won't be able to make the game better. You shouldn't see it as rude, the guy is giving very accurate feedback for a game he cares about
Don't think it's appropriate to make personal attacks on developers. I know it's partly a "for content" thing but it's not constructive and it's not conducive to discussion with the developers, which is what this should be. Criticisms of the design were valid - the ad hominems were not.
what exactly was the ad hominem? suggesting the devs are on drugs? conversely, id guess they were hitting the sauce pretty hard when designing vestal. makes more sense since they love their whiskey
Saw this and was waiting the whole runtime for some "personal attack" for none to arrive. Saying the developers must've been on drugs when designing this (literally followed up with a "just like me" joke) is so far from what was described I'm sure this comment was made on the wrong video. Anyway Seraph Vestal is actually kinda fun toplay, I like the design of the concentrations and they're fun to slot into teams, but that's the only skills I've ever used because wow are the rest terrible. Honestly this video went easy on em ^^
I don't think Shuffle would post a video if it was genuinely an attack on the developers. It's clear this guy is playing up his frustration to exemplify his points on why the balance is so baffling. I think he did a good job illustrating how bizzare Vestal is because it feels like she's not playing on the same field as everyone else. It feels like Redhook purposely designed her to be as mediocre and boring as possible.
Dawg, these are some Reddit level takes you have here. She needs some work for sure, but she's not as awful and useless as you think she is. Not entirely sure why you wanted to be so smug and condescending throughout the whole video. I'm sure she'll be part of the rework this year anyway, I'm not sure what the point of the video is other than you wanting to sound well-versed. Would be happy to debate more about it anytime
1. There is no reason to bring a Vestal over any other hero except if you enjoy carrying deadweight 2. There was no reason to release Vestal in such a horrendous state and not do anything about it for a year I'm also sure she will get her rework in 2025
I'll come back to this game when official support ends and modders take balancing this mess in their hands. until then, DD1 will always be the superior Darkest Dungeon game
![[DEFINITIVE] Trinket Tier List | Darkest Dungeon 2](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/tO6UIJSqzYQ/mqdefault.jpg)
![[DEFINITIVE] Trinket Tier List | Darkest Dungeon 2](/img/tr.png)
Strange ranger bullying traumatized nun; more at 10
+15 stress
I have been ready for the sequel "When the Nun Bonks Back!" For sometime now. I just want Chaplain to be useable.
It’s a shame that Vestal suffers from the same problems that she had in DD1, a rather boring support style where the best skills are not super fun to use, and any creative paths or builds are just so weak that they’re not worth it. I do think the addition of consecrations was a great idea, and having moves power up with conviction tokens is also good, but vestal really needs access to some more diverse paths. If hellion can either be a one shot nuke or an unkillable tank that does no dmg, vestal should be able to have better paths than “Support, Support with debuffs, Support with buffs, and Support but worse”
Constructive criticism without shit talking the devs, didn't know the DD community had it in them
@@doctordice2doctordice210When the houndmaster nerf hit in 2016 the forums were in flames.
Good times.
Make Bonk Vestal Great Again
Was she ever great?
I felt that breath in as he was about to talk about Divine Grace
It was the cooldown that really sunk it in.
Right, time to build my team entirely around getting hand of light value now. I am creating the new DD2 meta as we speak.
Leper and Vestal front rank when?
Vestal melee only first rank when?
like im literally just finished grandslam with vestal and flagellant that sometimes use specifically the move he trashes.
heck hand of light confessor vestal is really good with scroll of profane, you can weakened AND taunt, just dont get shuffled
@@_Aidelweiss_ So DD1 Leper strategy then?
@_Aidelweiss_ as a Vestal enjoyer I'm gonna say you can grandslam with any team. Especially if that team has Flag in it. Dude carries runs by himself.
Every move has some use and can be useful, but it doesn't change the fact that Vestal is arguably the worst character by a mile!
Not to forget that Illumination is literally worse than Highwayman's Tracking Shot because the only difference between the two moves is that Tracking Shot sets up Combo. That's it.
I love Vestal and play with her all the time and that Mantra rant hits right in the heart lmao, so much true in a video.
When vestal first came out in early access, it seemed like the community loved her, and that was probably just because we were so starved for a dedicated new hero. I never felt good playing her. I felt like she was a liability, always losing her at the mountain boss.
Yea she is a deadweight. Since she is so slow the buffs are never impactful on the most important round. Compare to occultist who can remove block/dodge and give debuffs. Move something out of position, nuke something out of orbit. Or get decent heals at 50% health threshold. Everytime i bring vestal I always end up asking" why didn’t i bring Occultist?".
Only took 6+ months for the community to realize how bad she was on release. Part of the reason she is still in a horrendous state is that ANY sort of criticism of her many flaws was suffocated by fanboys.
I can finally watch DD2 content
Whoever decided that divine light and divine grace need some health threshold and cooldown without any way of buffing the healing was insane.
Main thing that made Vestal so good in DD was how she could outheal damage monsters like Countess, Sleeper, Vvulf or Swine King. Imagine having same healing in DD2 in DD1, you would not be able to beat Necromancer or even Brigand Pounder.
Yeah, especially compared to PD who has downright better healing lol.
@@John-uw2je Not only that, cures DoTs, can remove negative buffs and turn them to heal, her healing can get buffed without much hassle and has path which can buff it even more.
What made vestal good was also the ability to remove an entire party out of death doors each time it was her turn
@@bourhinorc1421 True, thats why I used Sleeper as an example, it can reliably put your entire team on death door and Vestal can save them all (plus her camping skill even can recover them with insane health and stress if they have DD debuff).
Now imagine DD2 Vestal against Sleeper lol.
I loved this vid (and in general all the Ranger/Shuff team content)! More Ranger Rants please!
Great analysis and I agree with everything. But saying things like "red hook in their infinite wisdom" is a huge turn off. They are immensely talented and work their asses off and they are giving you something to yap about.
Bad path idea that might be fun: make something based around always having no conviction. Kinda like occultist’s unchecked power, having Conviction at the start of her turn would apply debuffs, burn away positive tokens, or the like, but starting your turn with 0 conviction would give you 3. Make her moves not necessarily spend all the conviction at once, like the Bishops in the tangle, but get a big power boost whenever they’re used, flip the whole mechanic on its head.
Give vestal some wacky paths that aren’t just “put her in X rank.”
Vestal is like runaway: the secret is all paths are backrank paths
@@bourhinorc1421I tried running a frontliner Orphan, i really tried, but it's just so ass. Reynauld ended up carrying the whole squad on his back
@@fitzviandraduivenab2790 runaway in general is so ass sadly, controled burn carries boss encounters but outside of that she is kinda a constant weight that does too little damage and has very situational skills. The only way to make her good is to build a party around her situational skills (bleed healing, marking skill, frontline shuffle), which tbh is not worth it.
i havent played dd2 in so long that all of this sounds like its in another language but i still listened to every one of r4nger's velvet words mesmerized for the whole 15 minutes
69/10 would listen to more R4nger RantsTM
I like Vestal's low power, I think all she needs is better rank flexibility. She has so many paths and kit combinations that don't work just because one or two abilities that would make her good or well rounded can't be used on a given rank.
Give Confessor Judgment and Illumination useable at all ranks; BAM, you have a viable cc token control frontliner with block, guard, token removal and a bit of reach.
Chaplain is too vulnerable to stress to be a good tank. Make her Mace Bash 2 pips +100% damage, 3 pips reduce her stress by -1 and adjacent ally -1. Then let Divine Comfort and Ministrations be useable in rank 1 and 2 respectively.
I would disagree, hand of light is so horrible it’s not even funny. Every move is supposed to have usability, otherwise people will just ignore it. Buffing other moves just to overshadow already bad moves helps no one. Also, poor rank flexibility is supposed to be her weakness, same as the Leper.
Powercrept by characters that came out two years before she did. That stings a certain kind of way. She is really the only character I want to see reworked as her one decent path you just name her token bot.
Finnaly good dd2 content on this chanel
Shuffle in shambles rn
Shuff's voice changed
Very fun video! I enjoyed watching and it made me laugh. Vestal's kit is one I find very cool in concept. It's a kit that (I think, I dont actually know if this is the reason red hook designed it this way) has some pretty meh skills but they're mostly to wait for her conviction to build up so she can use a very powerful skill. However it ends up feeling like she builds up so she can use a very skill.
Her kit feels pretty bad I think because when you're doing well she isn't doing much and when you're doing poorly her conviction moves don't do enough to turn the tables in your favor.
going confessor regen-hand-nuclear bonk that ignores block and dodge is actually very fun. The rest is not, don't even equip other skills so you can forget they exist.
Also i always though i was doing something wrong not getting any value out of her. Good thing i'm not alone on this
The description is very accurate.
one more thing about chaplain is that she doesn't get benefit from dodging the skill.
there are skills like benefit from getting hit like leper's ruin. but that only one skill and it also counts dot.
I think Wanderer Mantra is actually okay-ish. It's based off her concecrations, which are the only reason to bring her anyways, and heals with no cooldown and no threshold. Not much healing, not reliable healing when you need it, but SOME healing on two targets to help mitigate the gradual attrition taken by frontliners. The tricky thing about it is that you probably have about a 50/50 chance of Vestal actually having a turn 3 to use on it.
It's outclassed by the Seraph version, but so is everything.
I tried running chaplain vestal with MAA and templar cruzader (just to have a consistent healer), and still was a struggleto get value in mantra, in an entire run I got maybe 1 or 2 valuable uses of chaplain mantra, in her own this moves suck
I LOVE that he is mad about the 2 turn CD on divine grace when it use to be 4 at release :)))))
On Judgement - would be fair to mention that it hits any rank, which is rare quality. Strange to see Mace Bash limited to frontline targets tho.
As much as I like the Highwayman and Graverobber changes, how those two were picked to get updated first over Vestal is a mystery to me.
So new tier list?
Consecrations should apply a buff on the character in that rank when first used as well, would make it more useful but not broken.
Red Hook hates Junia.
Vestal needs a huge buff by adding abom into the game, that way they can finally become canon
Great rant, can't agree with absolutely all takes, but Vestal definitely need some love and refining
Poor vestal, i love her so so much but everytime i play her she is almost always something akin to dead weight. heartbreaking
am i tripin or is his voice strange?
Made me chuckle, does this man have a YT channel?
Wait, is Vestal an actual character in DD2? I thought it was a theorical lesson on how NOT build a class
14:15 huh i guess he was right
This is a good video.
Common Ranger W
Can someone point me to Strangers YT or Twitch, if he has one? Thx!
I totally agree!
Oh no this unhinged guy again...
Vestal and Leper comprise my least-run and least-favorite characters in DD2. The amount of work you need to put in to make them even playable outstrips any degree of fun I might get out of them.
Yeah, but at least lepper rewards said work, while vestal just goes from bad to mediocre. And with leper you can use runaway, crusader, duelist, occultist, jester, man-at-arms and even highwayman, because any of them like to put combo tokens to the front, or have a reliable way of healing/ignoring blind. But with vestal, I usually need to build a team around her needs, even though she is supposed to be a support!
@@vicenteignaciodiaz7012I always felt like lepers damage was way too lackluster for the support and team building required
@@FatWalterWhite69 Hey dude, you left some comment regarding travel heal in my original comment on this video, it got deleted, I didnt have time to read it in time (idk why), could you write here again what was in that reply? thx.
@@FatWalterWhite69 I think tempest leper damage is fine. Would even say it's bit on the higher side. I wish the poe support was more rank flexible. Since his whole stick tanking.
Have no reasone to take wanderer leper though. Since tempest and poet gives huge stat buffs on damage or tanking.
All Leper really needs is his low roll damage bumped up a bit to make him less reliant on crit, landing a swing with him for 6 damage feels like shit, bump him up to 7 or 8 and I think he'd be perfect.
Just to preface this, Vestal still sucks, but you are going way overboard on how bad she is. 1/2
"Vestal loses access to her best moves and this is why you should never play her in front". Literally no. You lose Grace, but not really since Vestal really likes dance teams. Like a LOT. This allows her to swap between frontline/backline when played correctly. It takes an insane amount of management and specific teambuilding for a payoff other heroes just get for free, which is why she's really shit right now, but saying "Vestal sucks in front and should never be played there" is wrong.
"HoL on Wanderer is one of the worst skills in the game". Disagree. 1-3 reach with some damage makes it an okayish token clear and is your only offensive option as frontline Vestal, since Bonk will consume your conviction before you get crit and want to pop Max Grace. It's the safer option and provides a solid bit of extra survivability with the Block. It's a solid Mastery, since if you Master it Vestal starts shitting out Strenght like no other hero.
"HoL is not good bc Consecrations generate tokens better" Yes, but are you pressing Consecrations literally every turn? No. With every path you have to take at minimum 1 action between Consecration uses and for frontline Wanderer Vestal this is her best option since Bonk sets you back 2 turns on Max Grace, Comfort/Sanctuary can be a bit too slow at times, Illu sometimes does literally nothing and you don't always need to press your recovery buttons. It's your best offensive filler move and prolly what you equip alongside Consecration/Heal/util when you play Vestal in a midrange dancy type of role. You are also talking about the Consecrations as if you run both at all times. You rarely do this since very often you want to do something other than "press slow Defensive Consecration" turn 2, so I find only having Light for most fights is better.
"Sanctuary is better defensive utility than HoL" True, but you are simply ignoring the token clear aspect of HoL. You can clear Block with it from Ranks 1-3, which is a lot more useful than you give it credit for.
"You don't want Strenght on Vestal bc other frontliners deal more dmg than Max Bonk anyways" True, this is why I never run Bonk. It can pop off bc you can set yourself up very easily (especially on Seraph), bc +100% dmg Strenght Block Dodge Pierce hits for 18-24 which is pretty nuts. Is it worth the setup and building around? No, but you can very easily just get full Bonk just by existing (especially on Seraph), so if you have the space it's a decent play to go for it.
"HoL barely changes on paths" True, bc you did mention Confessor HoL. Chaplain is trolldespair in literally every aspect so not worth talking about, Seraph doesn't change it, which is prolly good since it's actually even better there. You really need that offensive filler between Light refreshes, since you have 4 empty actions instead of 2 like the other paths.
"Confessor HoL gets powercrept by Yawp" This man does not value token clear lmao.
"Illu on Wanderer isn't terrible" What is this man on. This move sucks 90% of the time and is only really good for Act 4, but then you just pick Confessor. This is completely dead 90% of the time, since your turn 1 is almost always a Consecration and Vestal isn't fast enough to outspeed most Stealth enemies before they lose Stealth next turn anyways. The Dodge clear is cool, but Combat item --> literally any other move is both more value and still clears 2 Dodge. And don't forget you prolly press this move from turn 2 onwards, so most enemies likely don't have a whole lot of Dodge anymore. HoL provides almost the same reach, but gives more Token clearing for Block, chip damage on hit and defensive setup for Vestal and sets up others when Mastered. The Mastery on Wanderer Illu is absolute cope, enemies rarely generate Dodge and you can very often do this thing called "killing them" instead. Or just throw combat items. Your ass is not using those 10 inv slots worth of throwable combat items anyways so might as well use them as dodge clears. You just always have a better option available that actually gives value when you hit through Dodge with Vestal. Judgement does damage and I already explained HoL.
2/2
"Illu on Confessor" Yeah. This is true. I just don't run it that much tbh. Its good if you know the enemies coming up generate annoying positive tokens, but against most normal fights it's like a 50:50 on if it does literally anything. Vestals space is already limited, so this kinda falls out of the kit for me pretty often. Sure clearing that crit token is nice, but you probably know when an enemy that generates lotsa crit is coming up. And for raw token clearing, HoL+ is just better.
"Searing Strike > Judgement" Surely Leper reach isn't an issue for Searing Strike, so clearly bc it deals more damage it is a better move :clueless:. Yeah this is not an argument. This argument is flawed on a basic level since it's basically the equivalent of "Hounds Rush is worse than Collect Bounty bc less damage". Actual cope statement. Omnireach is an incredible tool and someone who has limited move space like Vestal can't afford to run multiple reach options, so being able to target any Rank with Judgement is actually pretty good.
"Which you generate by tanking hits with Chaplain" HUH?????? WHAT?????? Is this supposed to be Chaplain only? Are we just ignoring Seraph???? Wanderer???? Like the actually good paths???? Can I say "Plague Grenade sucks bc Surgeon cuts the Blight chance so clearly it must be a shit move" now. Is this where we are at.
On Judgement: Yeah it's still not great. Backline Vestal runs it bc it's your only offensive option, but it's still shit bc it eats your conviction which you'd rather use on Heals to make them heal actually good numbers. Removing the entire conviction effects is probably a buff tbh bc it gives backline Vestal an option to press that's guaranteed value without sacrificing your future heals. Right now it's your tool for "I know I can gerenate like 2 conviction" or "I only have 1 Conviction so it's fine to press".
Confessor Judgement: Literally never run this this thing sucks for all the reasons stated in the vid. Play Vestal in front and save up Conviction for Mantra/Grace instead. This move being this shit is literally the reason why Confessor Vestal is only good on Dance teams bc your backline kit is literally nonexistant.
Everything with Grace: This man is actually spitting straight facts. Make the Healing Treshhold change with Conviction would be my fix, but eh. You run this bc otherwise Vestal is a hardsupport without any offense/recovery. Dance her back and bank all your conviction and pray to god you get to use this. The Healing output is actually pretty good, you are literally getting a Flag self-heal on anyone when you pop Max Grace, but very often your hero just explodes before you get the turn to press this. This is why Vestal really only works on hyper-aggro Dance teams, since unless you kill 2-3 enemies quickly with the Strenght Tokens she provides, Grace can't outheal even 2 enemies focusing without any backup plan or hope for the next heal to come around. Also the reason Seraph is so much better than the other paths, since it's the only one that can generate Max Grace before to comes off cooldown. (Chaplain is not a path)
Fortitude is good exlusively on Seraph for longer fights bc it's a slow non-offense option you press on turn 2. Just use Light or any other move. Vestal likes hyper-offense, so a defensive buff is...not exactly great. It's good for longer fights bc you can hope that the amazing defense Fortitude+ generates is enough to keep your team going before the Boss damage catches up to you. Playing for the long game with Vestal is...not advisable, since Grace is...well shit for any fight longer than like 3 turns.
Ministrations is just as niche as Fortitude bc you equip it for fights with big DoT or Stun and literally never else. It takes up a slot and needs you to dance back or play cope backline Vestal. Vestal likes hyper-offense so much that you can very often just ignore DoT's altogether, since most of the time you end the fight before they can tick more than once. Too clunky and doesn't favor Vestal's preferred playstyle for fights where removing Stun isn't something you plan for.
"Mace Bash is actually good on Chaplain" Your first mistake is picking Chaplain. Seraph generates more Conviction consistently on teams that allow Vestal to actually use her better offensive frontline moves without losing her backline utility moves. Seraph also gets incredible Max Bonk setups with specific teams: Jester Hwm Vestal Gr for example gets a guaranteed fullbonk with Strenght on turn 2, since you can do Solo, Light Rank 1, Repartee turn 1, into Hwm Vestal Gr Jester positions with Speed on Jester. Then you have Strenght Finale (1) --> Strenght Pirouette (2) --> Strenght Bonk (3) on turn 2. Is this worth going for? Usually not, since Hwm + Pirouette is enough to kill most Rank 1/2 enemies, but it's really good into bigger frontline enemies, like every size 2 enemy or Boss in the frontline. This is the type of team that favors Vestal, since you put out insane damage very quickly on heroes that can't get Strenght very easily with mutliple ways to move Vestal back to heal with Grace. It also allows her to use her fairly big HP pool and defensive abilities with HoL/Sanctuary, since Nightsworn Repartee allows her to Taunt. 90% of the time you'd much rather press Doolest --> Comfort or HoL to finish off something left over by Hwm + Gr dmg.
Sanctuary: Why are we talking about Chaplain like it's an actual path again? Sanctuary is good bc it's a defensive tool that's more flexible than the rest of her kit. It pairs very well with the fragile nature of Dance teams, since most of the big dancers (Gr and Jester) are fairly frail and like to be guarded. Very good move. Don't master this it's just baiting your greed. HoL+, Mantra+ and Grace+ are right there.
Light: Yeah this is the move you build around. This is why you want dance teams. Just to multiproc Light. And it's the reason why Seraph is her best path. Getting full Conviction turn 2 is really good.
Comfort is a cope move. Like this man is spitting here. You don't have space for a move that generates zero (0) offensive tempo on a hero that needs to throw the entire team into full offensive tempo generation mode to work. Literally just don't. If you find Icon of Light upgrade this and put her into Rank 4 and maybe you can get some semblance of value from this.
Mantra: Wanderer Mantra sucks. You do not have Mastery for a move that needs 3 turns to come online. Fight is literally over at that point if you play Vestal on a team built around her strenghts. Same with Confessor. Chaplain is not a path.
Seraph likes Mantra and even kinda wants to upgrade it, (now bear with me) AT THE FIRST INN, bc it allows you to basically do stalling from DD1. No Treshhold Healing? Satisfactory. You press this at the end of combat when your Consecrations are not gonna generate any value anyways for a very big heal on two people. Later on this is your cope that you can survive until Turn 4 to pop it before your Consecrations disappear to keep your team going against Act Bosses.
I should prolly explain my hate for Chaplain huh.
So:
Chaplain is a straight nerf to: Conviction generation, HoL, Mantra. It changes Sanctuary, but this is prolly a nerf too.
Conviction is insanely inconsistent, since you have to hope you get hit. This assumes you do not apply any Dodge or Blind at all. Then you get a 25% to generate 1 conviction from enemies attacking. Enemies don't always attack. If you use a full turn to generate guard, you instead get a 50% to generate one per enemy attack. This also has anti-synergy with Vestal's entire gameplan of "KILL KILL KILL QUICKLY KILL I CANNOT HEAL MORE THAN ONCE KILL KILL KILL" since you need to leave enemies alive. Confessor and Wanderer are consistant and Seraph has insane Conviction generation. Just don't. You are not spending braincells building around this gimmick. Every other path offers the same payoff for Conviction anyways.
HoL sucks. Strenght > Block. Also deals less dmg. You need to kill people. Turtling is gonna expose Vestals weakness of having one-time use heals.
Mantra sucks for all the reasons in the vid. You need other heroes to get any semblance of value and it makes your heal inconsistent in the way that enemies can say "Nuh uh" and target the Guarded hero to remove the entire Guard.
Sanctuary only changes on Mastery (you don't Master this). Even when you Master it, it's just 1 Block+ and 1 extra attack. If this is enough to give up the Conviction vomiting Seraph does or the consistency/plannability of Wanderer/Confessor, sure. See this as the only bright spot. I will consider you clinically insane, but sure. Go ahead.
This feels like it’s straight out of 2016 in a cringy Leafy/rantsona type way. It’s like baby sensory content for angry manchildren.
Nah this video is actually good. Comparison disregarded.
The criticism is on point, but the devs are people too. If they don't dare to make mistakes to learn from, they won't be able to make the game better. You shouldn't see it as rude, the guy is giving very accurate feedback for a game he cares about
I agree vestal sucks.
Don't think it's appropriate to make personal attacks on developers. I know it's partly a "for content" thing but it's not constructive and it's not conducive to discussion with the developers, which is what this should be. Criticisms of the design were valid - the ad hominems were not.
and the devs usually do a good job listening to the fanbase. so attacking them in that case makes it even worse in my opinion.
what exactly was the ad hominem? suggesting the devs are on drugs? conversely, id guess they were hitting the sauce pretty hard when designing vestal. makes more sense since they love their whiskey
Saw this and was waiting the whole runtime for some "personal attack" for none to arrive.
Saying the developers must've been on drugs when designing this (literally followed up with a "just like me" joke) is so far from what was described I'm sure this comment was made on the wrong video.
Anyway Seraph Vestal is actually kinda fun toplay, I like the design of the concentrations and they're fun to slot into teams, but that's the only skills I've ever used because wow are the rest terrible. Honestly this video went easy on em ^^
This is the definition of hyper sensitive. Some people just can't take ironic/satiric content.
I don't think Shuffle would post a video if it was genuinely an attack on the developers. It's clear this guy is playing up his frustration to exemplify his points on why the balance is so baffling. I think he did a good job illustrating how bizzare Vestal is because it feels like she's not playing on the same field as everyone else. It feels like Redhook purposely designed her to be as mediocre and boring as possible.
She’s good but man is she just so boring
Dawg, these are some Reddit level takes you have here. She needs some work for sure, but she's not as awful and useless as you think she is. Not entirely sure why you wanted to be so smug and condescending throughout the whole video. I'm sure she'll be part of the rework this year anyway, I'm not sure what the point of the video is other than you wanting to sound well-versed. Would be happy to debate more about it anytime
1. There is no reason to bring a Vestal over any other hero except if you enjoy carrying deadweight
2. There was no reason to release Vestal in such a horrendous state and not do anything about it for a year
I'm also sure she will get her rework in 2025
I'll come back to this game when official support ends and modders take balancing this mess in their hands.
until then, DD1 will always be the superior Darkest Dungeon game
wait so who's ranger? he's so much more fun to listen to than shufler lmao, his edititing seems better too. cant find him anywhere tho
he is shuffle moderator in live streams
@@hasanplaster1510 huh, i wish he run the channel instead
lol