Shattered Kingdoms

Regarding aiming high, it seems like there is not enough downside to counter the upside. To me it makes sense that if you decide to aim upper, your miss chance should go up as you try to aim for that head shot and outright fail sometimes. That's a change I may make soon.

A half a second 'o stout c shield' and an armor buff and less flee spam waiting for the "regain feet" message would have gotten him out of there. Maybe the HoL does too much dmg but if you take zero measures to stay alive, no nerf will save you. If you are always buffed then you can see if someone (who must have been buffed in this case) is dealing more dmg than he should.

In other words first do the necessary for your character, then blame the others or the code.

Aiming upper you deal more dmg, but with aim mid you have a good chance to cut the arms a couple rounds before the enemy is dead. While in aim low they can't bash/trip/dirt (maybe shield block perfectly too). If there is a need for a change to the upper dmg then it should be really slight.

I agree with -Johnix-
Aim mid and lower remain an often picked choice in combat, for reasons stated.
Damage per aim seems balanced as is, and if one of the areas would be tweaked the rest should follow. Perhaps not in same way though.

Honestly, using the Hammer as a reason to argue whether melee damage in general needs to be fixed probably isn't the best example.

I'm curious as to how quickly he would have chopped off your arms if he was aiming mid, for example.

I'm not saying the Hammer is imbalanced, (I haven't seen much of it in action recently, although apparently it will be seen more often soon enough) but I am saying that it -might- be, and trying to judge whether melee damage is balanced based on a log of a Hammer vs. a Darky isn't the best idea.

I mean honestly, this is the same cabal that brings you this:

one-rounding a tribunal guard at 100% hp with a human hammer barb.

The advantages and disadvantages of aiming both upper and mid seem totally balanced to me.

Also, not to give away too much, but most of the classes that can do the most damage with HoL are also the most susceptable to spells and ability that hamper concentration/dispel the weapon.

Give away to much, I'm intrigued.

A change, huh? I thought this was already the case.

Aim upper vs. Aim mid seems to work fairly well right now. Aiming upper results in the most damage, but aiming mid results in a great chance of cutting off someone's arm. If you're fighting somebody wearing a two-handed weapon (i.e., a merc with anything but a khopesh or kama) then cutting off an arm will result in an insta-win. I think that the tactics are balanced.