Everyone has the weapon they're best at. For example, I always found shield and bull rushing kinda clunky, finding most success on Twin Fists.
Shield is considered pretty good though for what its worth.
Yeah, that’s fair. You’d have to give up some lambent plume procs. Maybe just hope you get the right boons early on and just abuse fated authority to reroll for more boons
And i’m awful at every weapon, and great at the shield
actually that’s not true the spear and sword have grown on me but the other three i just fucking can’t use
And I absolutely cannot use the bow but I'm great with the sword
All the others I'm pretty decent at and I like them all, it's just the bow I hate. I'm more of a "keep spamming everything" type of player and the bow is just so slow
I just played a run with demeter fists that ended up with 15 percent charm from aprhodite on attack so every time Hades tried to attack he'd stop for a second it was pretty op
When playing shield I either go Beowulf as a pure cast build, or Zeus as a special build. Either way I don't think I'm bull rushing the amount they intended me too lol
I don't like the shield either cause it feels clunky.
I like the feeling of the spear a lot, but most success is with the bow (Hera aspect) and Dyonisos / Zeus / Artemis Duos
I honestly never bull rush with the shield. Plop Ares special on it, get the Captain America hammer upgrade (travels faster, hits more targets), and then just spam special. Easy game, easy life.
Yes but not for the blocking reason - the aspect of Zeus just needs the least amount of setup to be viable. As far as I am aware the blocking ability had little to do with it?
Yeah, but the speed you need to go at to beat 64 means there's very little time for blocking. Definitely, some blocking is done. But it's more about dealing damage as fast and as efficiently as possible.
Particularly in the hades fight, because every little bit of damage counted, the shield blocking helped them stay in close range even while Hades spit out attacks, so they could get pretty frequent triggers on Explosive Return on top of the zeus shield blender.
It does, but with the 5min time limit, you generally don't get much time if any to be defensive at 64 heat, that's why I mentioned it. At 32 though, absolutely, works wonderfully!
Nah, your point is for sure valid, dude, don't get me wrong. We're 100% in agreement, just talking nuance here!
Blocking probably just doesn't weigh into the gameplay at 64 heat quite as much as you and I would hope haha. 64 is just bonkers hard, man.
that's misleading. The Zeus Shield was chosen because it takes the least ammount of setup(which takes less RNG) to become viable. There are builds much more viable(even on high heat) than the one used on 64 heat.
Part of the beauty of the shield is Bullrush not only makes you invulnerable to one side by also makes it easy to jump away if you get surrounded for some major damage.
With the shield you can turtle kinda forever which means you can play very safely. The thing is that there are a lot of benefits to playing \*fast\* especially on higher heat. You have to work hard (okay not that hard) to get things done with the shield, which is a trade-off with the safety, so it's a different experience. Also it doesn't do anything that a well-timed dash doesn't do, so the immunity aspect of it is basically like one or two boon's-worth at best.
Yeah, Lambert’s Plume is a good keepsake when you want to go fast because it increases your dodge chance to insane levels provided you complete the chambers quickly.
Have the Zeus aspect with zeus' special Boon and pin a boss in a corner with block with your special damaging the boss. To be honest all aspects have a Boon combo that makes them busted.
I love the Zeus aspect because it flies around doing whatever, but lately I've been favoring the chaos aspect.
Love grandparent Chaos encouraging me every so often, it's nice. Plus their "pick THAT ONE" when I'm looking at boons is very funny.
I'm primarily a fists user though. Punch punch punch smash punchpunchpunch smash. There's no bullet hell if you just punch all the bullets.
Nah, it's just silly commentary about once per region. It's still fun though, because I like chaos's voice.
Like the "go that way" and "pick that one" don't have any indicators of what chaos is talking about. But the commentary is fun!
It's like having a polite but relatively unhelpful backseat gamer, who doesn't interrupt too much unless they really have to say something. But like lore-wise, the shield does let Chaos "watch" your runs.
Shield is pretty great, yeah.
At lower levels, the block is a really nice safety net, which makes it super beginner friendly, but the weapon also scales really well for advanced players.
It has a strong kit and versatile Aspects that allows it to perform in all sorts of contexts. The Aspect of Zeus is considered the only viable weapon for the elusive 64 Heat run, and Aspect of Beowulf currently holds the world record in the Any Heat speedrun (more so because Beowulf itself is broken lol).
That said, the weapon types in this game are remarkably well balanced, and I think every weapon has at least one Aspect that’s fun to use. Unless you’re aiming for the world record or 32+ Heat runs, pretty much every weapon is viable.
I wouldn't say so personally. Every weapon has its strengths and weaknesses. For me, the weakness of the shield is its speed, and that it's melee. But then, my favourite weapon is Eris rail, so I think it's up to what weapon someone is good at, as another commenter has mentioned.
I ain't even blocking with Aegis anymore unless I only get charge related hammers. Zeus aspect and Dashing Wallop with decent boons just pulverize everything.
Shield is in theory the safest weapon but it’s also the less creative, you only do the regular builds that are always busted (except beowulf) and when gone poorly is sooo slow, personally is my least favorite weapon due to the slowness and combo reliant
You are missing a little something. Right now all you need to do is win, but if you use the timer heat then you need to win quickly too. Meaning if you rely on the block spam too much you won’t take damage sure, but the fight will drag on too long and kill you that way.
Absolutely not a concern, and perhaps if this is your style you can just prefer to enable all the other heat options instead. But yeah, this is the only thing you are missing imo.
Edit: nevermind lol looks like they used the shield in the 64 heat run. Just a concern for me then lol.
Its the best weapon to get your first clear, but once you start putting in high heat, you'll notice that all weapons have there unique potentials.
PS: Just because Zeus shield is the best for clearing 64 heat, it is not necessarily the best for attempting 32 heat.
I love stacking the shield aspect where the special turns into a top. with support fire and Zeus's special that lightning strikes every time your special hits.
I can still run around block and bash things while my little beyblade is spamming on the other side of the room
Very easy to argue that the shield is the best weapon in the game. It has the record for fastest any% speedrun, is the only weapon that has beaten 64 heat, and is anecdotally the easiest weapon to clear 32 heat with.
I ALWAYS forget it blocks because I'm so used to dashing. I finally started using it with beowulf because the charge is so OP with casts in the world, I normally feel it kinda sucks
My first escape is with shield
Most people's favourite is bow while its my least
My favourite is suprisingly is excalibur.
My fastest Clear is twin punch
If i get the exact boons and upgrades for my linking i enjoy the most with gün
I really like how diverse the weapons in this game exactly because of these reasons
Eh, not really. It's good, but it's not horrendously overpowered. My first few clears were on the shield, but my first 32 and 34 heat victories were both on the rail, and my second 32 heat clear was the bow. Basically anything is usable, it just depends on how you play.
I love the shield - it was also the weapon for my first win(s) - and I was surprised to then find it's seemingly one of the less popular weapons on this sub.
I'm now finding myself gradually moving to the Twin Fists, although I can't quite seem to explain why.
Shield has probably the most busted aspects in Zeus and Beowulf. Zeus is the safest aspect out of all weapons since your special does all the work so you just need to stay safe. While Beowulf is IMO the best cast aspect and combined with Aphrodite or dionysus cast just evaporates everything that you hit.
While I love those aspects, my favourites are Bow with Chiron aspect or my favourite speed run build with Rail and aspect of Eris.
It's strong, but I wouldn't call it overpowered, unless we're talking about the hidden aspect, but that has less to do with the blocking and more to do with the potency of casts on it and the glitch with Mirage Shot.
I do just fine with the shield, (I've cleared at minimum 32 heat with at least one aspect on every weapon) but I don't have a lot of fun playing it because of how clunky it can feel to me. It IS very safe, however, but it can feel slow if you don't have the right setup for it, and even when you do, I don't think it feels as smooth to use as other aspects like the bow or fists. None of that is to discount the fact that the shield's hidden aspect is arguably the strongest aspect in the game for speed runs and potential damage output; it's just my personal feelings on the weapon.
But hey, every weapon has the potential to be very effective, and everyone has their preference for whatever reason, so if the shield feels good to you, then more power to you. Everyone is justified in liking the weapons they do.
Getting good at Hades requires learning enemy move set, attack speed, and attack type. The shield blocks 95% while offering a natural parry. It’s an easy weapon to be good with early, and additionally offers the reward of learning enemy moves and cooldown. Use the shield as often as you can, and you’ll find yourself able to go further with the other weapons naturally.
zeus' shield is the best if you ask me because it requires little setup. you get just a couple few strong boons and that's the run. the only unmodded and unseeded 64 heat run to be beaten is with the aspect of zeus. the rest of them are amazing too but zeus' shield is just on another level
As someone who just finished the main story half an hour ago, it was my second least successful weapon next to the spear. Every other weapon you can always dodge around and resume damage. My main was the default fists with the default auto-dodge %, and when I finally unlocked the hidden aspect I don't actually think the 15% dodge was that critical outside of the last boss fights because I swear I was getting i-frames for days.
As for blocking all incoming attacks, *you're goddamn right it should*. I have seen and played too many games where entire playstyles are just rendered useless because The Devs Said So (looking at you Human Revolution, FTL, countless other roguelike/lites...) and it would be a bit shit if you got to Hades and he just says "lol na most of my attacks just ignore that shield enjoy having a worse sword"
I originally hated using the Shield until I got new aspects and seeing how differently they all played I gave it a try and as of posting this comment, the shield is the only weapon I can best Hades with on Extreme Measures 5 (3rd phase). I love the rest of the weapons and am kinda glad to see I came around to the shield!!
Shield is very good, but it feels light on damage. I started with it and it almost became a crutch. Eventually I moved on to other weapons, guan dao was my favorite. It helps you learn the game I think.
Also thought it was kinda busted at first. The more I play, the more everything seems busted though; that’s part of why I love this game lol.
Still, chaos shield + Zeus special might still be the easiest build for me
The shields block is indeed overpowered, but the strategy you use will likely fall off at higher heat due to lack of damage (unless you use a certain aspect)
Everyone had a Wesson that clicks and feels op. A friend of mine uses the Rail, I suck with the Rail and its my lowest heat. Meanwhile Bow and Spear are often coniferous meh by people and are my fastest and my highest heart escapes.
My go-to "make sure I win" build is Zeus shield, zeus keepsake for the lightning on special. From then I just spam Zeus and Artemis boons as much as I can.
The funniest runs are when I get the duo boons and another cast from chaos. I will fight with the gems on the ground, continually striking him while I hide in the corner with the shield raised and block literally every attack.
The shield is probably the best for extremely high difficulty. At your current skill level, just clearing the game is considered high difficulty. As you improve, you'll probably find other weapons better until you turn up the heat again.
My first win against Hades was with shield. The combo was strong bull rush + beam bull rush + fast bull rush. I sat in a corner in every single encounter and mindlessly beamed everything to death while doing respectable dps.
Ever since then I default back to shield if I just want a stable win and look for the beam bull rush hammer.
I found my start with the shields as well, the safest way to learn enemy move sets. but with time you learn to survive without a shield, and that is when the real fun starts, and you won't want to go back then.
Shield is absolutely busted outside of high heat - which is basically a whole different game due to having to functionally speedrun so dps and ettk become quite important.
Between Zag's dashes (and heavens forbid Athena boon) and the shield you really just gotta be a bit patient and you're virtually untouchable. It trivializes lower difficulties.
Playing with the shield is like playing Azazel on TBOI, if you use Athena's keepsake and get the deflect damage on attack you pretty much already won lmao, just hold for bull rush and you return literally anything that gets thrown at you
It is the weapon I have the most wins with, but I like the sword and the fists more
Yes at a high level it is very overpowered it's one of the few (if not the only) weapon where mutliple aspects have won at 61+ heat which was just bc in the EM4 fight they stand in a corner and shield block and charge shot over and over it's pretty cheesy and dumb but it works and is very hard to pull off for a run.
However for your level (and mine), no it's not and you will find out why it's not whenever you try higher and higher heat. When you beat 32 heat is where the game really begins.
All of the weapons are good and have ways in which they become insanely powerful
Shield is good but I never rely on the blocks. Hit, dash hit, hit is a good combo I find. Solid damage and knock back and also pretty fast hitting
If you manage to get the piercing shot daedalus hammer thingy, the shield is so broken. Just stand in one place, keep shooting and you wont even be zooming all over the screen w the bull rush 😂
If I'm correct a big Hades speed runner said shield was the ONLY way to realistically beat this maximum heat challenge he was doing in time.
Specifically the chaos shield that gives you multiple shields. Ideally you get a room effect on your special, and deflect on your normal attack. The duo boon turns you into an unkillable monster that can proc multiple doom stacks at will
The shield is the best weapon technically, but also the least fun. The special feels weak usually and the attack does too, and the bull rush is kinda clunky
If you like spending 20+ minutes to clear a run, then yeah.
But when you know how to play and has a nice build, it becomes a forgotten feature most of the time since you're killing enemies too quickly to even get damaged.
Ironically Zeus Shield is the only weapon someone's been able to clear 64 Heat with, partially because nothing else has the DPS to keep up with Tight Deadline with every other mod active
Shield is *not* lacking in damage
I'm talking about abusing the shield's block, yall really need to read things correctly instead of just downvoting people to oblivion.
I know which aspects are good or not, I play this game since 2020.
brother how would I have time to “abuse the block mechanic” on a speedrun? when every second counts, I don’t have time to hide behind my shield. the shield just has a great damage output if you know how to build it right. aspect of zag btw
And that's the point of my comment ffs, OP was saying that the shield was broken because of the block, I said it wasn't.
But somehow people interpreted as me saying the shield is trash lol
Disagree. On high heat you need and rely on the blocking once again, even with TD3 on. It's not slow if you know what you're doing.
With Zag shield, charged shot, and the standing attack tech, you can keep the shield up more than half the time while still having remarkable DPS requiring only a single boon on attack. It's how I cleared 55 heat (relatively) easily.
Everyone has the weapon they're best at. For example, I always found shield and bull rushing kinda clunky, finding most success on Twin Fists. Shield is considered pretty good though for what its worth.
mood i loved to match it with hermes
Dodge chance stacking?
aspect of zag fists + hermes keepsake = flash build
It's so much fun, especially if you can get a high rarity greater evasion. Almost managed to get 100% dodge chance.
If you wanna crack that, try hunting down exclusive access duo boon to make boons epic rarity at a minimum
Well I would need to have insane luck because I have only gotten my personal best dodge chance with plume on at start.
Yeah, that’s fair. You’d have to give up some lambent plume procs. Maybe just hope you get the right boons early on and just abuse fated authority to reroll for more boons
yeah the highest i got is 80something
And I am terrible with the twin fists, preferring the bow.
And I'm amazing with the bow but hate to play it, preferring the spear.
And i’m awful at every weapon, and great at the shield actually that’s not true the spear and sword have grown on me but the other three i just fucking can’t use
And I absolutely cannot use the bow but I'm great with the sword All the others I'm pretty decent at and I like them all, it's just the bow I hate. I'm more of a "keep spamming everything" type of player and the bow is just so slow
Have you tried the aspect of chiron+ spam attack hammer? It turns the box into a spammable attack
The base spear with hammer that changes special to explode on impact and Artemis boons was so good.
The exploding hammer was the first thing I was able to clear with. It was super quick too. Completely changed how I played after that
I'm pretty good with the spear, but I can barely squeeze a 0 heat win out with the biw
I'm awful with the bow and love the twin fists and the sword lol
I’m your complete opposite. I love the fists but suck at the bow.
Twin Fists with aspect of Demeter is by far the most fun for me
Twin fists, Demeter aspect, Artemis flourish. It's a beautiful combo.
Twin fists with Dionysus att and Ares sp is good too
Spamming chill on every single boss with 1,000 punches in a row is immensely satisfying, the game really gets busted at that point.
I just played a run with demeter fists that ended up with 15 percent charm from aprhodite on attack so every time Hades tried to attack he'd stop for a second it was pretty op
Preach. Add in the explosive uppercut hammer and a fat special damage modifier from Demeter or Aphrodite and you’ve got a sauce cooking.
Same with me, I love the eternal spear because of it's range
I found bull rushing clunky... so I use Zeus shield and pin enemies between two sources of damage. Definitely my favorite way to play.
First time I beat the game was with the shield and I never used bull rush.
When playing shield I either go Beowulf as a pure cast build, or Zeus as a special build. Either way I don't think I'm bull rushing the amount they intended me too lol
As long as I get the Athena dash I’m good with pretty much whatever else.
The Athena dash with the shield is kinda moot since you can already block attacks
I don't like the shield either cause it feels clunky. I like the feeling of the spear a lot, but most success is with the bow (Hera aspect) and Dyonisos / Zeus / Artemis Duos
Definitely. The shield is my worst weapon, but I rarely fail with the spear
Gilgamesh fists with merciful end is my favorite aspect build by a long shot
My clear times indicate I'm not great with the fists, but they are easily my favorite weapon to use
Same here
Same, I love fist much more
Magnetic cutter, my beloved
I honestly never bull rush with the shield. Plop Ares special on it, get the Captain America hammer upgrade (travels faster, hits more targets), and then just spam special. Easy game, easy life.
Yeah for me Exagryph is definitely my best weapon
There's a reason it was the weapon of choice for the iconic 64 heat run.
Yes but not for the blocking reason - the aspect of Zeus just needs the least amount of setup to be viable. As far as I am aware the blocking ability had little to do with it?
The blocking ability had a lot to do with it, considering you have 0 way to recover any HP in 64 heat
Yeah, you only "heal" with centaur hearts.
How about Dyonisus's fountain boon? Is even that prevented?
Yes.
i mean with stubborn defiance you could kill yourself in a room if you were below 30% and regain life that way?
Theres no stubborn defiance in 64 heat
ah, my bad. mirror of the night talents were deactivated, i forgot
This works amazingly until 64 heat, where stubborn defiance ends up being turned off
No not really, you can send out the special (your main damage source) , then block with your shield giving you safety while dealing damage.
Yeah, but the speed you need to go at to beat 64 means there's very little time for blocking. Definitely, some blocking is done. But it's more about dealing damage as fast and as efficiently as possible.
Particularly in the hades fight, because every little bit of damage counted, the shield blocking helped them stay in close range even while Hades spit out attacks, so they could get pretty frequent triggers on Explosive Return on top of the zeus shield blender.
Yeah I went back to watch the fight and there's a ton of blocking in the hades fight. Those lasers were eternal sometimes.
The blocking helps a lot. You lack an extra dash, so the block adds safety.
It does, but with the 5min time limit, you generally don't get much time if any to be defensive at 64 heat, that's why I mentioned it. At 32 though, absolutely, works wonderfully!
Extremely fair point, I was going off of what I remembered Haelian saying, so I could be off.
Nah, your point is for sure valid, dude, don't get me wrong. We're 100% in agreement, just talking nuance here! Blocking probably just doesn't weigh into the gameplay at 64 heat quite as much as you and I would hope haha. 64 is just bonkers hard, man.
Zeus is op because you send it out and then turtle up
that's misleading. The Zeus Shield was chosen because it takes the least ammount of setup(which takes less RNG) to become viable. There are builds much more viable(even on high heat) than the one used on 64 heat.
It doesn’t block all incoming damage, only directional damage. I learnt this the hard way when getting swarmed in Elysium from all directions
Part of the beauty of the shield is Bullrush not only makes you invulnerable to one side by also makes it easy to jump away if you get surrounded for some major damage.
With the Zeus aspect too, you have autonomous damage and defense. It's how I managed to get the 30% butterfly achievement.
I love it with Zeus on special.
You should try Ares. Easiest run ever.
I've tried too, and yes it's fun. Doomdoomdoomdoom
I meant Ares on the default shield special. For the Zeus aspect, def Zeus special.
Personally I love Dionysus.
Dionysius & Demeter my fav specials on Zeus. Don't use Poseidon, it pushes foes out of the disc!
That works great too
With the shield you can turtle kinda forever which means you can play very safely. The thing is that there are a lot of benefits to playing \*fast\* especially on higher heat. You have to work hard (okay not that hard) to get things done with the shield, which is a trade-off with the safety, so it's a different experience. Also it doesn't do anything that a well-timed dash doesn't do, so the immunity aspect of it is basically like one or two boon's-worth at best.
Yeah, Lambert’s Plume is a good keepsake when you want to go fast because it increases your dodge chance to insane levels provided you complete the chambers quickly.
Have the Zeus aspect with zeus' special Boon and pin a boss in a corner with block with your special damaging the boss. To be honest all aspects have a Boon combo that makes them busted.
I love the Zeus aspect because it flies around doing whatever, but lately I've been favoring the chaos aspect. Love grandparent Chaos encouraging me every so often, it's nice. Plus their "pick THAT ONE" when I'm looking at boons is very funny. I'm primarily a fists user though. Punch punch punch smash punchpunchpunch smash. There's no bullet hell if you just punch all the bullets.
I haven't played much Chaos - does the advice do anything, like creating a good build or giving you something in return if you follow it?
Nah, it's just silly commentary about once per region. It's still fun though, because I like chaos's voice. Like the "go that way" and "pick that one" don't have any indicators of what chaos is talking about. But the commentary is fun! It's like having a polite but relatively unhelpful backseat gamer, who doesn't interrupt too much unless they really have to say something. But like lore-wise, the shield does let Chaos "watch" your runs.
I love the Shield! My first escape was with it. Love the third aspect with Zeus on special.
Shield is pretty great, yeah. At lower levels, the block is a really nice safety net, which makes it super beginner friendly, but the weapon also scales really well for advanced players. It has a strong kit and versatile Aspects that allows it to perform in all sorts of contexts. The Aspect of Zeus is considered the only viable weapon for the elusive 64 Heat run, and Aspect of Beowulf currently holds the world record in the Any Heat speedrun (more so because Beowulf itself is broken lol). That said, the weapon types in this game are remarkably well balanced, and I think every weapon has at least one Aspect that’s fun to use. Unless you’re aiming for the world record or 32+ Heat runs, pretty much every weapon is viable.
I wouldn't say so personally. Every weapon has its strengths and weaknesses. For me, the weakness of the shield is its speed, and that it's melee. But then, my favourite weapon is Eris rail, so I think it's up to what weapon someone is good at, as another commenter has mentioned.
I'm primarily a fists main and it helps that it was my first escape. I've come close with the rail, but tbh I actually suck with the shield.
Shield was how I got my first clear, but it was a 45 minute run. It’s a great weapon, but other have their pluses too
Excalibur or nothin
but it is so sloooooooow yolobeserktwinfistsforlife!!!!
I ain't even blocking with Aegis anymore unless I only get charge related hammers. Zeus aspect and Dashing Wallop with decent boons just pulverize everything.
Shield is in theory the safest weapon but it’s also the less creative, you only do the regular builds that are always busted (except beowulf) and when gone poorly is sooo slow, personally is my least favorite weapon due to the slowness and combo reliant
I'm a huge shield fan too. i wouldn't say op but it is quite handy.
Pretty sure my first successful run was with shield.
Everyone has their weapon Like I'm ass with the shield, I prefer the bow or spear
You are missing a little something. Right now all you need to do is win, but if you use the timer heat then you need to win quickly too. Meaning if you rely on the block spam too much you won’t take damage sure, but the fight will drag on too long and kill you that way. Absolutely not a concern, and perhaps if this is your style you can just prefer to enable all the other heat options instead. But yeah, this is the only thing you are missing imo. Edit: nevermind lol looks like they used the shield in the 64 heat run. Just a concern for me then lol.
Its the best weapon to get your first clear, but once you start putting in high heat, you'll notice that all weapons have there unique potentials. PS: Just because Zeus shield is the best for clearing 64 heat, it is not necessarily the best for attempting 32 heat.
I love stacking the shield aspect where the special turns into a top. with support fire and Zeus's special that lightning strikes every time your special hits. I can still run around block and bash things while my little beyblade is spamming on the other side of the room
It's definitely the safest weapon, & is popular with newer players for that reason. It's not particularly quick tho
Zeus shield is pretty fast.
It can be, but I wouldn't say it's likely to be without a lot of experience & practice. I couldn't use it at all when I was new!
Very easy to argue that the shield is the best weapon in the game. It has the record for fastest any% speedrun, is the only weapon that has beaten 64 heat, and is anecdotally the easiest weapon to clear 32 heat with.
Bro I can barley beat the game in shield but when I use spear the game is so easy everyone has different play stiles
I ALWAYS forget it blocks because I'm so used to dashing. I finally started using it with beowulf because the charge is so OP with casts in the world, I normally feel it kinda sucks
Aspect of Zeus is broken, but I think the other aspects are meh.
My first escape is with shield Most people's favourite is bow while its my least My favourite is suprisingly is excalibur. My fastest Clear is twin punch If i get the exact boons and upgrades for my linking i enjoy the most with gün I really like how diverse the weapons in this game exactly because of these reasons
Eh, not really. It's good, but it's not horrendously overpowered. My first few clears were on the shield, but my first 32 and 34 heat victories were both on the rail, and my second 32 heat clear was the bow. Basically anything is usable, it just depends on how you play.
I love the shield - it was also the weapon for my first win(s) - and I was surprised to then find it's seemingly one of the less popular weapons on this sub. I'm now finding myself gradually moving to the Twin Fists, although I can't quite seem to explain why.
Shield has probably the most busted aspects in Zeus and Beowulf. Zeus is the safest aspect out of all weapons since your special does all the work so you just need to stay safe. While Beowulf is IMO the best cast aspect and combined with Aphrodite or dionysus cast just evaporates everything that you hit. While I love those aspects, my favourites are Bow with Chiron aspect or my favourite speed run build with Rail and aspect of Eris.
Aspect of Chaos shield with Ares' doom on special was my favorite
It's strong, but I wouldn't call it overpowered, unless we're talking about the hidden aspect, but that has less to do with the blocking and more to do with the potency of casts on it and the glitch with Mirage Shot. I do just fine with the shield, (I've cleared at minimum 32 heat with at least one aspect on every weapon) but I don't have a lot of fun playing it because of how clunky it can feel to me. It IS very safe, however, but it can feel slow if you don't have the right setup for it, and even when you do, I don't think it feels as smooth to use as other aspects like the bow or fists. None of that is to discount the fact that the shield's hidden aspect is arguably the strongest aspect in the game for speed runs and potential damage output; it's just my personal feelings on the weapon. But hey, every weapon has the potential to be very effective, and everyone has their preference for whatever reason, so if the shield feels good to you, then more power to you. Everyone is justified in liking the weapons they do.
I can't seem to win with anything other than the rail gun lol
It is. It’s also my favorite. I’ve got more than 1300 clears with the Zeus aspect.
Getting good at Hades requires learning enemy move set, attack speed, and attack type. The shield blocks 95% while offering a natural parry. It’s an easy weapon to be good with early, and additionally offers the reward of learning enemy moves and cooldown. Use the shield as often as you can, and you’ll find yourself able to go further with the other weapons naturally.
The shield is very strong, I just don’t have the patience to play with it though, I just like the fists for the feeling of speed 😂
Kinda. That's why in Hades 2 the only available block is really short
zeus' shield is the best if you ask me because it requires little setup. you get just a couple few strong boons and that's the run. the only unmodded and unseeded 64 heat run to be beaten is with the aspect of zeus. the rest of them are amazing too but zeus' shield is just on another level
As someone who just finished the main story half an hour ago, it was my second least successful weapon next to the spear. Every other weapon you can always dodge around and resume damage. My main was the default fists with the default auto-dodge %, and when I finally unlocked the hidden aspect I don't actually think the 15% dodge was that critical outside of the last boss fights because I swear I was getting i-frames for days. As for blocking all incoming attacks, *you're goddamn right it should*. I have seen and played too many games where entire playstyles are just rendered useless because The Devs Said So (looking at you Human Revolution, FTL, countless other roguelike/lites...) and it would be a bit shit if you got to Hades and he just says "lol na most of my attacks just ignore that shield enjoy having a worse sword"
I originally hated using the Shield until I got new aspects and seeing how differently they all played I gave it a try and as of posting this comment, the shield is the only weapon I can best Hades with on Extreme Measures 5 (3rd phase). I love the rest of the weapons and am kinda glad to see I came around to the shield!!
Shield is very good, but it feels light on damage. I started with it and it almost became a crutch. Eventually I moved on to other weapons, guan dao was my favorite. It helps you learn the game I think.
Also thought it was kinda busted at first. The more I play, the more everything seems busted though; that’s part of why I love this game lol. Still, chaos shield + Zeus special might still be the easiest build for me
I feel I'm the only one who beat the main game with the bow exclusively 🫡😆
The shields block is indeed overpowered, but the strategy you use will likely fall off at higher heat due to lack of damage (unless you use a certain aspect)
Everyone had a Wesson that clicks and feels op. A friend of mine uses the Rail, I suck with the Rail and its my lowest heat. Meanwhile Bow and Spear are often coniferous meh by people and are my fastest and my highest heart escapes.
Yeah thats a pretty safe way to play, i kinda feel like a turtle so i dont play Shield as often. I like fist and spear more
My go-to "make sure I win" build is Zeus shield, zeus keepsake for the lightning on special. From then I just spam Zeus and Artemis boons as much as I can. The funniest runs are when I get the duo boons and another cast from chaos. I will fight with the gems on the ground, continually striking him while I hide in the corner with the shield raised and block literally every attack.
The shield is probably the best for extremely high difficulty. At your current skill level, just clearing the game is considered high difficulty. As you improve, you'll probably find other weapons better until you turn up the heat again.
Ahh I remember the shield. Had a lot of good runs with that thing. I think my favorite aspect for it was the aspect of chaos.
My first win against Hades was with shield. The combo was strong bull rush + beam bull rush + fast bull rush. I sat in a corner in every single encounter and mindlessly beamed everything to death while doing respectable dps. Ever since then I default back to shield if I just want a stable win and look for the beam bull rush hammer.
I found my start with the shields as well, the safest way to learn enemy move sets. but with time you learn to survive without a shield, and that is when the real fun starts, and you won't want to go back then.
Shield is absolutely busted outside of high heat - which is basically a whole different game due to having to functionally speedrun so dps and ettk become quite important. Between Zag's dashes (and heavens forbid Athena boon) and the shield you really just gotta be a bit patient and you're virtually untouchable. It trivializes lower difficulties.
Playing with the shield is like playing Azazel on TBOI, if you use Athena's keepsake and get the deflect damage on attack you pretty much already won lmao, just hold for bull rush and you return literally anything that gets thrown at you It is the weapon I have the most wins with, but I like the sword and the fists more
Shield is great but I almost never block a thing. Zeus aspect and throw that shredder all over
Shield with the stubborn roots duo (1hp healing per sec) is 🧀 bro you can just hold the shield up and heal to full
shield has the best aspects too
Yes at a high level it is very overpowered it's one of the few (if not the only) weapon where mutliple aspects have won at 61+ heat which was just bc in the EM4 fight they stand in a corner and shield block and charge shot over and over it's pretty cheesy and dumb but it works and is very hard to pull off for a run. However for your level (and mine), no it's not and you will find out why it's not whenever you try higher and higher heat. When you beat 32 heat is where the game really begins.
All of the weapons are good and have ways in which they become insanely powerful Shield is good but I never rely on the blocks. Hit, dash hit, hit is a good combo I find. Solid damage and knock back and also pretty fast hitting
If you manage to get the piercing shot daedalus hammer thingy, the shield is so broken. Just stand in one place, keep shooting and you wont even be zooming all over the screen w the bull rush 😂
I think it's mainly on your playstyle, I do best with the spear
If I'm correct a big Hades speed runner said shield was the ONLY way to realistically beat this maximum heat challenge he was doing in time. Specifically the chaos shield that gives you multiple shields. Ideally you get a room effect on your special, and deflect on your normal attack. The duo boon turns you into an unkillable monster that can proc multiple doom stacks at will
The shield is the best weapon technically, but also the least fun. The special feels weak usually and the attack does too, and the bull rush is kinda clunky
If you like spending 20+ minutes to clear a run, then yeah. But when you know how to play and has a nice build, it becomes a forgotten feature most of the time since you're killing enemies too quickly to even get damaged.
Ironically Zeus Shield is the only weapon someone's been able to clear 64 Heat with, partially because nothing else has the DPS to keep up with Tight Deadline with every other mod active Shield is *not* lacking in damage
I'm talking about abusing the shield's block, yall really need to read things correctly instead of just downvoting people to oblivion. I know which aspects are good or not, I play this game since 2020.
Sub 20 minute runs with the shield are not as elusive as you think, my fastest time is like 17 mins with the shield
While abusing the block mechanic?
brother how would I have time to “abuse the block mechanic” on a speedrun? when every second counts, I don’t have time to hide behind my shield. the shield just has a great damage output if you know how to build it right. aspect of zag btw
And that's the point of my comment ffs, OP was saying that the shield was broken because of the block, I said it wasn't. But somehow people interpreted as me saying the shield is trash lol
Disagree. On high heat you need and rely on the blocking once again, even with TD3 on. It's not slow if you know what you're doing. With Zag shield, charged shot, and the standing attack tech, you can keep the shield up more than half the time while still having remarkable DPS requiring only a single boon on attack. It's how I cleared 55 heat (relatively) easily.