Warhammer: Vermintide 2

Warhammer: Vermintide 2

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Bardin All Base Game Careers Mechanic Guide
By Royale w/ Cheese
Guide for all Bardin base game careers mechanic/talent and some build theory.
   
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---Ranger Veteran---
Career General Overview
Career Orientation
A range focus career that can provide strong team support utilities.

Pros: Single target build has high burst damage potential. Horde clear build has extremely high DPS. Versatile melee options. Strong team and support utilities.
Cons: Damage potentials are locked behind very few talents. No consistent Super Armour burst damage. Fairly low moveability

Basic Stats
Base HP: 100
Career Skill Cooldown: 120 sec
Has 5% base Critical Strike chance
Unusable Weapons: Dual Axes, Trollhammer Torpedo, Drakegun, Drakefire Pistols

Perks
Loaded for Battle
Increases ammo capacity by 50%.

Increases the ammo capacity along with ammo related Traits/Talents.
Rounded to the closest integer.
Fast Handsr
Increases reload speed by 15%.
Ingenious Improvisation
Using any Healing Supplies, Potions or Grenades has a 10% chance to not consume the item.

Stack with all similar effects additively.

Career Skill & Passive
Disengage
Bardin deploys a smoke bomb for 10 seconds that conceals him from enemies whilst he stays inside the cloud. Also gains increased ranged attack power while concealed.
When press the career skill key(default key: F), deploy a smoke bomb.
The smoke bomb hitbox is a sphere centred at Bardin, can go through walls and floors. Stagger all enemies within 7 units.
After deployed, creating a smoke area with the radius of 8 units for 10 seconds.
While inside the smoke area, Bardin is invisible to all enemies, but cannot walk through enemies. Hitting enemies does not break the stealth.
While inside the smoke area, Bardin's range weapons deal extra damage. All range attacks pierce armour/super armour.
Holding the career skill key(default key: F) will show you the stagger radius of the smoke bomb.
Survivalist
Specials drop ammunition pickups on death that restore 10% of maximum ammo when picked up.
Anyone killing a special will result in an ammunition pickup spawns right next to Bardin.
The ammunition pickup has infinite duration.
The pickup shares the appearance of a normal Ammunition Pouch.
Ammo restore is rounded to the closest integer, and is at least 1.
Talent Mechanic & General Usage (Part I)
LeveL 5 Row
Second Wind
Staggering enemies with a Melee Attack grants up to 2 Temporary Health determined by the Stagger Strength. Killing blows instead restore 0.25 THP.
Melee attack grants 0.25/1/2 THP per unit. Push grants 0.5/1 THP per unit. Both can only be triggered on 5 units. Dual wield attacks can trigger twice.
Melee killing blows grant 0.25 per unit without limit.

Should be used with weapons like Hammer and Shield weapons.
Carve
Damaging multiple enemies in one Melee Attack grants Temporary Health.
Provide 1 THP when hitting one unit.
First 5 units you hit grants 1 THP per unit per hit. Next 5 units grants 0.5 THP per unit per hit. Caps out at 10 unit per hit/7.5 THP per swing. Dual wield attacks can trigger twice.

Should be used with War Pick/Axe/Dual Hammers/Great Hammer/Great Axe/Cog Hammer.
Execute
Killing an enemy with Melee Attack restores Temporary Health. Killing more dangerous enemies grants more Temporary Health.
Can be triggered multiple times per attack. Does not include melee explosion kills or melee DoT kills.

Should be avoided most of the time, as Ranger Veteran mostly use range weapons for single target damage.

LeveL 10 Row
Last Resort
Bardin gains a 25.0% Power increase when out of ammunition.
High value for niche melee focus builds
As a power boost, it increases your damage/stagger/cleave.
Triggers upon firing the last shot.
Projectile range attack will benefit from the 25% Power increase if it's the last shot.

Since it requires the Ranger Veteran to be out of ammo to be functional, it is used by melee focus builds. Usually it's paired with Throwing Axe, as you can freely adjust the amount of ammo you carry. And since Throwing Axe is a projectile weapon, the last axe you throw will benefit from the 25% Power increase, allowing you to one shot almost all man-sized enemies.
Master of Improvisation
Reloading a weapon reduces the cooldown of Disengage by 2 seconds.
Good value strong utility range/hybrid builds
Refund 2 seconds/1.67% of max Cooldown each time.
Throwing Axes can trigger this effect by either firing the axe, or picking up an axe/recall an axe when there is none left.

Provide a decent amount of cooldown to most Ranger Veteran builds. Although it's not game changing, the strong utility and damage that Ranger Veteran's career skill can provide makes this talent better than other options on this row most of the time.
Foe-Feller
Increases attack speed by 5.0%.
Low value hybrid builds
Although consistent, the damage increase you get from this talent is one of the lowest in the game, especially since most of Ranger Veteran's range weapons don't benefit from attack speed. Still, if you want to boost the melee aspect of a hybrid build without losing all your ammo, it is the only option here.
Talent Mechanic & General Usage (Part II)
LeveL 15 Row
Bulwark
Enemies that you stagger take 10% more damage from melee attacks for 2 seconds. Deal 20% more damage to staggered enemies. Each hit against a staggered enemy adds another count of stagger. Bonus damage is increased to 40% against enemies afflicted by more than one stagger effect.
Does not benefit a range based career. Should be avoided.
Mainstay
Deal 40% more damage to staggered enemies. Each hit against a staggered enemy adds another count of stagger. Bonus damage is increased to 60% against enemies afflicted by more than one stagger effect.
Does not benefit a range based career. Should be avoided.
Enhanced Power
Increases total Power Level by 7%. This is calculated before other buffs are applied.
Increases power level by 7.5%.
As a power boost, it increases your damage/stagger/cleave.

Increase both your melee and range damage. Should be picked most of the time.

LeveL 20 Row
Drunken Brawler
Killing a Special grants 50% chance to drop a bottle of ale. Ale grants 3.0% attack speed and reduces damage taken by 4.0% for 5 minutes when consumed. Can stack 3 times.
Consistent all-around team boost
When Survivalist is triggered, there is a 50% chance that one bottle of ale spawns on top of the ammunition pickup.
The bottle of ale has infinite duration on the ground.
Drinking a bottle of ale grants 3% attack speed and 4% damage reduction, last 5 minutes. Can stack up to 3 times for total of 9% attack speed and 12% damage reduction.
Drinking a new bottole will refresh all stacks duration.

Since the ale lasts 5 minutes, this talent basically provides 9% attack speed and 12% damage reduction to the whole team. It is also the second best ammo talent on this row as the ale drop does not replace the ammo pouch.
Overall a very good talent that provides consistent value in both offence and defence.
Grungni's Cunning
Increases ammunition restored by Survivalist caches to 30.0%.
Ammo hungry builds/compositions
Triple the amount of ammo Ranger Veteran can provide to the team. For ammo hungry weapons like Grudge Raker and Masterwork Pistol, this talent is essential if you want to have high range uptime. And if there are melee careers in the team that also use ammo hungry weapons, or just a bit too trigger-happy in general, this talent can also help them sustain very well, as the base ammo pouch would most likely only gives them 1 ammo per pickup.
Scavenger
Killing a special has a 20% chance to drop a potion or bomb instead of a Survivalist cache.
Difficulty spike solution
When Survivalist is triggered, there is a 20% chance that one item spawns instead of the ammunition pickup.
Speed/Strength/Concentration Potions and Fire/Frag Grenade all have the same spawn chance.

The items this talent provides can help you solve difficulty spikes like patrols/bosses very easily. No matter the difficulty, after couple items and/or bombs, no enemies will survive beside couple lords. However, the downside of having less ammo is definitely worth contemplating here. You will basically be limited to only use your range weapon for special sniping and boss bursting, unless you use Throwing Axe.
Overall, it is a talent with powerful benefit but requires the player to tailor their build or playstyle around it a bit.
Talent Mechanic & General Usage (Part III)
LeveL 25 Row
No Dawdling!
Increases movement speed by 10.0%.
High player agency defensive utility
Movement speed gives you an easier time at evading enemy attacks, as you can move out of their hitbox. And more importantly for a backline career, it allows you to move to a more favorable fighting position easier where you can use your range weapon safely. However, in compare to the other two options on this row, all its value comes from the player actively utilizing this tool. Plus numeric value wise, this talent doesn't provide much, it is usually better to pick other options for either better damage or a more consistent passive defence tool.
Exuberance
Bardin takes 30.0% less damage from behind. Whenever he scores a headshot, this bonus applies to all damage taken for 7 seconds.
Low player agency defensive utility
Provides damage reduction if enemies' attacks are not coming from front ~132.8°(cos(θ) = -0.68).
The universal damage reduction can be triggered by hitting either the head or the neck of an enemy.
Both melee attacks and range attacks can refresh this talent's duration.

Fairly straight forward defensive talent. The 7 seconds duration makes it quite consistent in general, as both headshot and neckshot can trigger the effect. Overall, the most consistent and the default talent on this row.
Firing Fury
Hitting 2 enemies with one ranged attack increases speed of Bardin's next reload by 35.0%.
Low use case DPS talent
After cleaving 2 units, increase reload speed for 2 seconds, regardless of how many reloads are initiated.
Require one singular range attack to cleave 2 units.
For Shotgun attacks, require one singular pellet to cleave 2 units.
Cleaving through teammates also contribute to the 2 units count.

Due to the nature of this talent, it requires the player to spam range attacks into the horde. This makes Grudge Raker the natural choice here, but Masterwork Pistol/Crossbow can both work with this talent too for some extra range horde clear. Also recommended using this talent along with Master of Improvisation and Grungni's Cunning, as all three of these talents promote a heavy range spamming playstyle.

LeveL 30 Row
Exhilarating Vapours
Allies within Bardin's smoke gain 8.0% attack speed. They also gain 3 temporary health per second.
Consistent defensive utility
The healing/attack speed effect shares the exact area of the smoke(radius of 8 units).
The healing/attack speed effect is triggered every time players enter the smoke area. Players can gain temporary health rapidly by leaving and entering the smoke area repeatedly.

Adding another usage to Ranger Veteran's career skill. Now, beside higher range uptime + range DPS increase, you can also use it to help your team establish a stable frontline during horde fight with the extra heal and attack speed. When used normally, this talent can provide a total of 30 temporary health. But if players exploit the healing tickrate by getting in and out of the smoke radius quickly with WS or AD spam, you can easily get 50+ THP from it.
Overall, a good defence focus talent that can provide consistent value to the team.
Surprise Guest
Disengage's stealth does not break on moving beyond the smoke cloud.
Good clutch tool and small consistency boost
Bardin now always has the full effect of Disengage during its duration(stealth/range damage/range armour piercing).
Cannot walk through enemies. Hitting enemies does not break the stealth.

The most obvious usage of this talent is to utilize the effect for clutching. This allows you to move and attack freely for 10 seconds without any worries. At the same time, for the two closer range weapons, Throwing Axe and Masterwork Pistol, this talent also increases your boss bursting consistency. Normally when you try to burst down a boss with Throwing Axe/Masterwork Pistol, you will lose aggro when you put down the smoke, and the boss will run towards your teammates, resulting them either outside your effective range or force you to leave your damage boosting smoke. This talent can solve that problem.
Ranger's Parting Gift
Activating Disengage causes the next bomb Bardin throws within the duration of the ability to not be consumed.
Strong burst/DPS option
After using Disengage, grants Bardin a buff that makes the next bomb he throws to not be used.
The buff has infinite duration.

The free bomb buff last indefinitely until you throw your next grenade. If you don't have the free grenade buff and predict you don't need your career skill for the next minute or two, you should use it immediately. If with the grenade buff and cooldown ready, you can throw 2 free bombs in a row, or 3 bombs if you are willing to lose then potential future usage. One free grenade is already enough to deal with small difficulty spikes like one group of elites with horde. But if you manage your buff/cooldown correctly, you get to use 2-3 grenades + 10 seconds of invisibility and range power boost in a short period of time, which is enough to burst down basically any difficulty spike in the base game by yourself.
In general, this is the default option for Ranger Veteran, an amazing talent that can help both regular pacing and difficulty spikes effectively.
---Ironbreaker---
Career General Overview
Career Orientation
A melee frontline with incredible durability and resilience to difficulty spikes.

Pros: High tankiness. Has access to a lot of strong crowd control weapons. Has the best ability to pull the whole team back from tough situations.
Cons: Low mobility. Very few builds have good damage potentials. Damage is locked behind a few weapons.

Basic Stats
Base HP: 150
Career Skill Cooldown: 120 sec
Has 5% base Critical Strike chance
Unusable Weapons: Dual Axes, Throwing Axe

Perks
Dwarf-Forged
Reduces damage taken by 30%.

Stack multiplicatively with other sources of damage reduction, including Impenetrable, to a total of 65% damage reduction during career skill
Doughty
Grants an extra Stamina shield.

Provides 2 stamina/1 stamina shield.
Resilient
Decreases stun duration after getting hit by an attack by 50%.

'Stun' refers to several elites/boss direct attacks that stop player actions. Including elites overhead, excluding elites pushes and enemy grab attacks.
Reduce the stun duration from 1 second to 0.5 second.

Career Skill & Passive

Impenetrable
Bardin taunts all nearby man-sized enemies, gains increased defence and can block any attack for the next 10 seconds.
The career skill hitbox is a sphere centred at Bardin, can go through walls and floors.
Stagger and grab the aggro of all none-boss/lord enemies within 10 units for 10 seconds, regardless if they are man-sized or not.
During the career skill, Bardin gains 50% damage reduction(to a total of 65% with Dwarf-Forged), 100% block cost reduction, and increases intensity decays which makes horde to spawn easier.
Does not interrupt or prevent any player actions, including attack/switch/use item/interact/revive/rescue/interact/movement.
Holding the career skill key(default key: F) will show you the stagger/taunt radius of the career skill.
Gromril Armour
Completely absorbs one hit every 20 seconds.
The next instance of damage from enemy or environment is nullified.
Does not prevent self damage/fall damage.
Talent Mechanic & General Usage (Part I)
LeveL 5 Row
Second Wind
Staggering enemies with a Melee Attack grants up to 2 Temporary Health determined by the Stagger Strength. Killing blows instead restore 0.25 THP.
Melee attack grants 0.25/1/2 THP per unit. Push grants 0.5/1 THP per unit. Both can only be triggered on 5 units. Dual wield attacks can trigger twice.
Melee killing blows grant 0.25 per unit without limit.

Should be used with weapons like Hammer and Shield weapons.
Execute
Killing an enemy with Melee Attack restores Temporary Health. Killing more dangerous enemies grants more Temporary Health.
Can be triggered multiple times per attack. Does not include melee explosion kills or melee DoT kills.

Should only be used with Axe, or if your build focuses on killing elites and there are no other careers competing for elites kill.
Carve
Damaging multiple enemies in one Melee Attack grants Temporary Health.
Provide 1 THP when hitting one unit.
First 5 units you hit grants 1 THP per unit per hit. Next 5 units grants 0.5 THP per unit per hit. Caps out at 10 unit per hit/7.5 THP per swing. Dual wield attacks can trigger twice.

Should be used with War Pick/Axe/Dual Hammers/Great Hammer/Great Axe/Cog Hammer.

LeveL 10 Row
Under Pressure
Drake Fire damage increases from -80.0% to 120.0% and ranged attack speed reduces from 100.0% to -50.0% depending on overcharge. Removes overcharge slowdown.
Drakefire Build
Removes the high Overcharge slowdown penalty completely.
At 0 Overcharge, Drakefire weapons have -80% range power and +100% Attack Speed.
Every 3 Overcharge, Drakefire weapons gain +20% range power and -15% Attack Speed. This effect can stack up to 10 times, maxing out at 30 Overcharge.
At 30 Overcharge, Drakefire weapons have +120% range power and -50% Attack Speed.
The power modifier changes Drakfire weapons direct damage and stagger power, does not change cleave or DoT damage.

When used properly, this talent is the best talent for Drakefire weapons build. But the mechanic can be a bit confusing, and requires the player to play around with the drawback.
In general, this talent reduces Drakefire weapons DPS when below 12 Overcharge, increases your DPS between 12 - 30 overcharge, and at 27 you have the highest DPS.
However, this assumes your attacks are affected by the attack speed modifier, and that's not true for all Drakefire attacks. Plus, you can bypass the attack speed restriction by tap your venting key. Keep in mind that attack speed also affects the amount of time you need to wait to swap after attacking, so even just for safety purpose, it's good to know the tap venting trick.
For Drakefire Pistols, both the primary attack and alternative attack are affected by the attack speed modifier. Overall, for primary attacks, you can use them at any heat level, as you would use it for sniping purpose time to time, and attack speed is important in that scenario. For alternative attack, although you can use vent to keep your overcharge at optimal level, you can just play at 30+ overcharge and tap venting after each blast to bypass the slowdown.
For Drakegun, only the primary attack is affected by the attack speed modifier. And like Drakefire Pistols primary, Drakegun primary attack can be played at any heat level since it's mostly used as a quick CC tool for enemies in front of you. For its alternative attacks, it's better to keep at as high heat level as possible, since the fire tickrate is not affected by attack speed. However, it is important to keep in mind that while spraying your alternative attack, Drakegun will continually gain more overcharge. Pay attention to it so you don't accidentally blow up.
Blood of Grimnir
Each nearby ally increases power by 5.0%.
Passive DPS increase
When there are 0/1/2/3 allies within 5 units of Bardin, he gains 5%/10%/15% power level. Bardin himself does not count as ally in this instance.
As a power boost, it increases your damage/stagger/cleave.

The simplest and most consistent passive DPS increase on this row. Although the numeric value is not high, there are no weird mechanics that the player need to play around with. Being a power level buff also means this is the only talent on this row that helps you no matter your build types, melee focused or not. Even certain Drakegun builds will prefer this talent over Under Pressure, as they have similar damage potential, but Blood of Grimnir does not require the player to micromanage overcharge level, so you can just stay in low heat to prevent slowdown and the potential of blowing up.
Rune-Etched Shield
Blocking an attack increases Bardin's power (and that of nearby allies) by 2.0% for 10 seconds. Stacks 5 times.
Situational team buff
Blocking an attack increase all players' melee power by 2% for 10 seconds, max out at 10%, regardless of players' location.
As a melee power boost, it in creases melee attack damage/cleave/stagger. Has no effect on range weapons/DoT/Items.

Unlike the description, this talent only increases melee attack damage/cleave/stagger. Because of this, the buff you apply to the whole team most likely won't benefit 1-2 range focused careers much. And for Ironbreaker himself, this talent is just inferior to Blood of Grimnir. And beside just having a lower number and worse buff type, requiring the player to block in order to trigger this effect just doesn't work very well in most difficulties. When played properly, Ironbreaker should be hitting and staggering enemies with your melee weapon to provide space, rather than blocking them.
Talent Mechanic & General Usage (Part II)
LeveL 15 Row
Bulwark
Enemies that you stagger take 10% more damage from melee attacks for 2 seconds.Deal 20% more damage to staggered enemies. Each hit against a staggered enemy adds another count of stagger. Bonus damage is increased to 40% against enemies afflicted by more than one stagger effect.
For Ironbreaker himself, this talent provides the least amount of damage on this row. At the same time for a pure stagger focus shield build, Enhanced Power is usually required to reach certain stagger breakpoints. Should be avoided most of the time.
Smiter
The first enemy hit always counts as staggered. Deal 20% more damage to staggered enemies. Each hit against a staggered enemy adds another count of stagger. Bonus damage is increased to 40% against enemies afflicted by more than one stagger effect.
Increases your single target DPS. Better for key target deletion. Should be picked most of the time when you are not building a pure stagger focus build.
Enhanced Power
Increases total Power Level by 7%. This is calculated before other buffs are applied.
Increases power level by 7.5%.
As a power boost, it increases your damage/stagger/cleave.

Increase both your melee and range damage. Allowing you to reach certain stagger breakpoints and should only be used for that purpose as a melee focus career.

LeveL 20 Row
Vengeance
Periodically generate stacks of Rising Anger every 7 seconds while Gromril is active, up to 5 max. When Gromril is lost, gain 8.0% attack speed per stack of Rising Anger for 10 seconds.
Inconsistent low uptime melee DPS boost
When Gromril is active, Bardin gains a stack of Rising Anger buff very 7 seconds, up to 5 stacks.
When Gromril is lost, Bardin gains (8% x Rising Anger stacks) attack speed for 10 seconds, up to 56% attack speed for 10 seconds.

Although this is the only damage option on this row and the max attack speed buff looks interesting, this talent is just very inconsistent and counterintuitive to your gameplay loop. After the 10 seconds attack speed buff expires, you need to wait for at least 17 seconds to get another possible boost, which is only 8%. For 56%, you need to wait for 45 seconds. At the same time, you need to carefully avoid taking damage to accidentally activate Gromril, otherwise you will end up wasting the attack speed buff on low priority targets. It might fit lower difficulty horde pacing better, allowing you to store stacks before horde spawn and unleash it during horde. But on higher difficulty, the uptime is too low as there are too many small dangerous fight to store the buff stacks properly and horde itself is too big to be killed under 10 seconds.
Gromril Curse
When Gromril Armour is removed all nearby enemies are knocked back.
High value defence utility
When Gromril is lost, stagger all enemies within 5 units of Bardin.

Provide tons of utilities to yourself and the team. It can help you interrupt Monk/Berserker chain attacks if you failed to block/dodge it, stagger groups of elites when you are in the thick of it, prevent monster chain/grab attacks, and stop assassins/hookrat to disable you. Overall best talent on this row.
Tunnel Fighter
Reduces the cooldown of Gromril Armour to 10 seconds.
Overkill defense boost
Numeric value wise, this is a pretty good talent, makes Ironbreaker much tankier. However, Ironbreak is already extremely tanky with his base toolkit, you don't really need to add more onto that aspect. On top of that, it is competing against Gromril Curse, which provides a lot more utilities and may prevent more damage when used against grab/chain attacks and disablers. Overall a decent talent but lacks meaningful identity and is worse than other option on the same row.
Talent Mechanic & General Usage (Part III)
LeveL 25 Row
Dawi Defiance
When Bardin's guard is broken there is a 50.0% chance to instantly restore all stamina.
Inconsistent niche defence
A passive boost to your block ability. However, between block cost reduction, extra stamina perk, and Impenetrable, it's very hard for Ironbreaker to lose all his block unintentionally. If you need more stamina, usually Miner's Rhythm is a much better choice, as it can give you more stamina to push too, not just blocking.
One interesting combo to keep in mind with this talent is weapon trait Parry. The Parry window can be reset by using push. Once your stamina is lowered enough after a lot of pushing, if you mess up your Parry then, there is a 50% chance you get your stamina back anyway, so you can use push to reset Parry again.
Overall, a pure defence talent that only provides it value in niche situations. Not recommended for most of the difficulties.
The Rolling Mountain
Killing enemies with melee attacks while on full stamina reduces the cooldown of Impenetrable by 2.0%.
Weapon dependent utility
A killing blow with melee weapons while Ironbreaker has full stamina refund 2.4 seconds/2% of max Cooldown each time.

Although Ironbreaker doesn't have strong melee killing power, cooldown refund to one of the strongest career skill in the game is still useful, especially since Impenetrable has one of the longest cooldown in the game. You should still pair this talent with weapons that doesn't use push in its horde clear combo and deal decent damage though.
Recommend pairing this talent with Axe/War Pick/Axe/Dual Hammers/Great Hammer/Great Axe/Cog Hammer.
Miner's Rhythm
After landing a charged attack Bardin recovers stamina 40.0% faster for 2 seconds.
Weapon dependent utility
Landing heavy melee attacks or Grudge Raker alternative attack gives you 40% stamina regen for 2 seconds.

A great crowd control tool if you can trigger this talent reliably and utilize the stamina it provides. For example, when combined with stamina regen trinket, Shield weapons can do the push-bash combo indefinitely. Axe/Hammer sometimes want to use this weapon too. Both of them can do a quick heavy attack to trigger this talent, and Axe wants to use the push to help with crowd control and Hammer can use stamina for more push attack combo.
Recommend pairing this talent with Shield weapons, or any builds that want to use more push/push attacks in general.

LeveL 30 Row
Drengbarazi Oath
Impenetrable increases power of nearby allies by 20.0% for 10 seconds.
High value team DPS boost
When activating Impenetrable, increases alley power level by 20% for 10 seconds if they are within 15 units of Ironbreaker. Ironbreaker also benefits from the power level buff.
As a power boost, it increases damage/stagger/cleave.

One of the few team power level boost in the game. On paper, it only lasts 10 seconds, which doesn't sound like a lot, but since it triggers when you use Impenetrable, it is basically guaranteed that your teammates can capitalize the DPS boost since now they don't need to worry about enemies attacking them for that duration.
Ironbreaker himself can also use this boost pretty well. Although you will have enemy aggros, you also gain a huge amount of damage reduction, allowing you to tank a lot more damage while attacking with the power bonus. You also have access to Trollhammer Torpedo, which benefit greatly from short duration high damage boost buff like this. You can also pair this talent with a horde clear melee weapon and The Rolling Mountain , to boost horde clear speed without losing all your cooldown.
Overall, an amazing talent for a more aggressive Ironbreaker playstyle.
Oi! Wazzok!
Impenetrable taunt now forces monsters to attack Bardin.
Niche boss/lord fight tool
Impenetrable now stagger and grab the aggro of all enemies, including boss/lord.

In theory, it looks like the best solution for boss/lord, but it isn't always the case for those fights and lacks other utilities.
For certain builds like Bounty Hunter Double Shots/Waystalker Piercing Shot, losing boss aggro can be devastating for their DPS, as it is a lot harder to predict boss head movement when they can't control boss movement themselves. If your team overall has good boss damage, or if Ironbreaker himself has Trollhammer Torpedo and some other items, Drengbarazi Oath can help to burst down the boss much better. And in certain situations, using Booming Taunt to pull all other enemies away from the team longer when they are fighting the boss might be just as efficient if not more in certain situations. The lack of other functionality really limits the use case of this talent.
Should only be used when you and your team are actively trying to adopt the boss fighting style of this talent.
Booming Taunt
Increases the radius of Impenetrable's taunt by 50.0%. Increases the duration of Impenetrable to 15 seconds.
Consistent numeric value boost
Increase Impenetrable radius to 15 units and duration to 15 seconds.

Straight forward boost for your career skill. The radius increase makes it so that it is very consistent to grab every single elites inside a patrol and/or the entirety of the horde. The extra duration gives your teammates more time to safely dealing damage, and allow yourself to benefit from the bcr/dr buff too.
Overall, a simple but effect option for a more defensive Ironbreaker playstyle.
---Slayer---
Career General Overview
Career Orientation
A melee DPS with high mobility and survivability.

Pros: High mobility. High tankiness. Very good and consistent melee damage.
Cons: Fairly vulnerable to specials. Low burst damage. Rely on certain weapons/talents for crowd control.

Basic Stats
Base HP: 125
Career Skill Cooldown: 40 sec
Has 5% base Critical Strike chance
Unusable Weapons: Axe and shield, Hammer and shield, Handgun, Trollhammer Torpedo, Crossbow, Drakegun, Drakefire Pistols, Masterwork Pistol, Grudge-Raker

Perks
Path of Carnage
Increases attack speed by 7.5%.
Drengi Grit
Charged attacks can't be interrupted by damage.

Only immune to damage interruption. Stun/disable/push from enemies can still interrupt you.

Career Skill & Passive

Leap
Bardin leaps forward to stun a target, and gains 30% increased attack speed for 10 seconds.
Cannot be initiated from midair.
During this career skill, you can switch weapons/items, attack/charge with melee weapons, use items.
Use this career skill will not interrupt interactions, including reviving teammates. However, most of the objective interactions on the map have distance limit.
Cannot be cancelled by player after initiated.
The player is not invincible during this career skill. To help to avoid taking damage, hold block(default key: Mouse 2) before starting the career skill to keep blocking during this. You can still cancel your career skill by releasing and pressing block again.
Holding the career skill key(default key: F) will show you the destination of the career skill.
Can leap through any units.
Slayer does not suffer from fall damage with the initial landing of this career skill.
After landing, create a small explosion around Slayer. Apply moderate amount of stagger to enemies within 2 units, and small amount of stagger to enemies within 4 units.
After activating the career skill, during the next 10 seconds, Bardin gains 30% attack speed, all his attacks cannot be interrupted by enemy damage, and cannot be knocked back by enemy range attacks(e.g Rattling Gunner/Warpfire Thrower).
Can be initiated without leaping forward by aiming your camera down. Still apply the stagger and Bardin still gains all the beneficial buffs.
Trophy Hunter
Hitting an enemy grants a stacking damage buff. Increases damage by 10%, stacking 3 times. Buff lasts 2 seconds.
Gain 1 stack per enemy hit. Can receive multiple stacks if the attack cleaved through multiple enemies.
Provides up to 30% weapon damage.
Increases all weapon direct damage, including Throwing Axe.
The attack that gains the Trophy Hunter stack also benefit from the new stack damage increase.
Talent Mechanic & General Usage (Part I)
LeveL 5 Row
Carve
Damaging multiple enemies in one Melee Attack grants Temporary Health.
Provide 1 THP when hitting one unit.
First 5 units you hit grants 1 THP per unit per hit. Next 5 units grants 0.5 THP per unit per hit. Caps out at 10 unit per hit/7.5 THP per swing. Dual wield attacks can trigger twice.

Should be used when you have a fairly passive playstyle.
Execute
Killing an enemy with Melee Attack restores Temporary Health. Killing more dangerous enemies grants more Temporary Health.
Can be triggered multiple times per attack. Does not include melee explosion kills or melee DoT kills.

Should be used when you have a fairly aggressive playstyle.
Sting
Melee strike restores 0.5 temporary health. Melee Critical Strikes and Headshots instead restore 2. Critical Headshots restores 4.
Can only be triggered once per weapon swing. Dual wield attacks can trigger twice.

Should only be used with Axe and Dual Axes when you have extremely high headshot rate.

LeveL 10 Row
A Thousand Cuts
Wielding one-handed weapons in both slots increases attack speed by 10.0%. Dual weapons count as one-handed.
Good flavour option for one-handed builds
One-handed weapons include Hammer/Axe/Dual Hammers/Dual Axes/Throwing Axe.

Although intended for one-handed builds, this talent falls behind in terms of DPS compare to Hack and Slash. Still a decent option if you prefer higher attack speed for your builds.
Skull-Splitter
Wielding two-handed weapons in both slots increases power by 15.0%.
Best-in-slot for two-handed build
Two-handed weapons include War Pick/Great Axe/Cog Hammer/Great Hammer.
As a power boost, it increases your damage/stagger/cleave.

Provides highest amount of DPS increase to two-handed builds.
Hack and Slash
Increases critical hit chance by 10%.
Best-in-slot for one-handed builds and mixed builds
Provides highest amount of DPS increase to both one-handed and mixed builds.
Talent Mechanic & General Usage (Part II)
LeveL 15 Row
Smiter
The first enemy hit always counts as staggered.
Deal 20% more damage to staggered enemies.
Each hit against a staggered enemy adds another count of stagger.
Bonus damage is increased to 40% against enemies afflicted by more than one stagger effect.
Increases your single target DPS. Should be picked most of the time.
Mainstay
Deal 40% more damage to staggered enemies. Each hit against a staggered enemy adds another count of stagger. Bonus damage is increased to 60% against enemies afflicted by more than one stagger effect.
Increases your horde clear DPS. However, Slayer already has enough horde clear capability from is weapons and attack speed buff, and his job should be more on focusing down high threat single target. Should avoid most of the time.
Enhanced Power
Increases total Power Level by 7%. This is calculated before other buffs are applied.
Increases power level by 7.5%.
As a power boost, it increases your damage/stagger/cleave.

Does not benefit a melee focus career as much as other talents.
Should be avoided.

LeveL 20 Row
Impatience
Each stack of Trophy Hunter increases movement speed by 10.0%.
Niche utility
Trophy Hunter now provides up to 30% weapon damage and movement speed.

Movement speed gives you an easier time at evading enemy attacks, as you can move out of their hitbox or move to a more favourable fighting position easier. For Slayer specifically, it also provides higher melee uptime and easier to deal with specials, since now you can chase them down.
However, Adrenaline Surge + No Escape provides same utility and more DPS because of higher Leap uptime. And stacking both Impatience and No Escape is overkill amount of move speed outside of speedrunning.
High Tally
Increases maximum stacks of Trophy Hunter by 1.
Niche DPS increase
Trophy Hunter now provides up to 40% weapon damage.

At first glance, this talent seems like the only damage option on this row. However, Adrenaline Surge provides 100% uptime of Leap attack speed buff during combat, which in practice is almost always more DPS than the ~7% increase High Tally can provide, especially during patrol/boss/lord fight where you cannot get cooldown back fast enough with Cooldown On Hit effect.
Adrenaline Surge
On max stacks, Trophy Hunter grants cooldown reduction for Leap.
Consistent DPS and utility
When you have 3 stacks of Trophy Hunter, gain a buff that provides 200% Cooldown Regen.
The buff lasts as long as Trophy Hunter is on max stacks.

The cooldown regen gives Slayer 100% Leap uptime, even when fighting single target. The more frequent activation of Leap itself also means synergy with all level 30 talents and chase down specials easier.
Overall, by far the best option in this row in both DPS and utility.
Talent Mechanic & General Usage (Part III)
LeveL 25 Row
Oblivious to Pain
Damage taken from Elite enemies or Monsters is reduced to 10 damage or half of its original value whichever is highest.
Medium coverage consistent damage reduction
After all other damage reduction calculation, reduce direct damage from elites/bosses/lords to 10 or half of that, whichever is highest.
Has no effect if the damage is below 10.

Provide up to 50% damage reduction against elites/bosses/lords direct attacks.
The best part of this talent is that the player doesn't need to micromanage the buff uptime. Unlike Grimnir's Focus which requires you to use heavy attacks time to time, Oblivious to Pain has no such requirement, which means with certain weapons you don't need to sacrifice DPS for damage reduction, if their optimal DPS combos skip heavy attacks.
However, there are still huge portions of total damage taken that this talent doesn't cover. All special damage dealt ignore this talent, and while it's pretty easy to get net positive THP gain during horde, taking a stray hit from a roaming loner regular enemy can be very devastating too, as they deal increasing damage when alone. This makes Grimnir's Focus the better option when you have high uptime, as when both are activated, in the worst case Grimnir's Focus is only 10% less damage reduction compared to Oblivious to Pain, but covers all types of damage.
Overall, should only be picked if you don't have good uptime with Grimnir's Focus for any reason.
Grimnir's Focus
Hitting an enemy with a charged attack reduces damage taken by 40% for 5 seconds.
High coverage damage reduction that requires player agency
A very high numeric value damage reduction talent, and its trigger condition is fairly easy to meet. However, the 5 seconds duration means the player need to micromanage its uptime pretty well, and may lose some DPS if the currently required melee weapon combo does not utilize heavy attacks. Still, it's worth learning and using this talent as this provides by far the best protection for Slayer on this row.
Overall, should be picked most of the time as long as you can keep a good uptime for this talent.
Barge
Effective dodges pushes nearby small enemies out of the way.
Extremely niche crowd control
When initiating an effective dodge, create a small explosion centred around Bardin.
Dodging without effective dodge count does not trigger this effect.
The explosion has a radius of 1.5 units. Has the same amount of stagger power as a light push(pushes from Dagger/Dual Daggers/Rapier, or outer radius pushes from normal weapons).

Both the stagger power and radius of this talent are underwhelming. The only units this talent can stagger are skaven and low tier chaos horde units, and their attack ranges can be larger than the stagger radius too. Even for low cleave weapons, a couple well-placed pushes will have much bigger impact on crowd control than its effect.
Should be ignored most of the time.

LeveL 30 Row
Crunch!
Increases stagger effect when landing on enemies using Leap by 100.0%.
Crowd control tool
The stagger effect from the explosion created by Leap is improved drastically.
Stagger power is increased to up to ~343% depends on the difficulty. Apply strong stagger to enemies within 3 units, and medium stagger to enemies within 6 units.

When combined with Adrenaline Surge, this talent turns Slayer into one of the best crowd control career in the game. The inner stagger radius is able to stagger every single elite enemy attacks except Chaos Warrior overhead even on Cataclysm, and you can put all other enemies into heavy stagger. And with the extra cooldown regen, you can use this effect every 10 seconds or less.
Best choice if you prefer the style where you hold the ground with your team when fighting.
Dawi-Drop
Increases attack damage while airborne during Leap by 150.0%.
Niche burst damage
Increase power level by 150% until landed with Leap.
As a power boost, it increases your damage/stagger/cleave.
Also affects the explosion applied by Leap landing, increasing its stagger power.

The most obvious synergy for this talent is by using Cog Hammer or War Pick, as they have a high damage heavy attack that can one shot most elites when combined with it. But Throwing Axe can also achieve the same breakpoints, and give you the option to leap at a different direction. And lastly, unlike the tooptip, Dawi-Drop just provides generic power boost. Which means when combined with Strength Bomb, it lets you instantly delete 30% - 40% of a monster's HP on Legend and Cataclysm with Shrapnel, or blow up half of the patrol with Explosive Ordinance.
Despite all these potential use cases, the mechanic of this talent makes it quite finicky to use, unlike other options on this row that provide consistent value. At the same time, with a proper build, Slayer doesn't really require the boost from Dawi-Drop, as he can already one to two shot most elites with the right weapons.
No Escape
Leap's attack speed buff also increases movement speed by 25.0% for the duration.
Consistent numeric value boost
Activate Leap now also provides you 25% movement speed for 10 seconds.

Compare to Impatience, Adrenaline Surge + No Escape provides same utility and more DPS because of higher Leap uptime, thus it is the preferred option when you want movement speed for your build to help you evade enemy attacks and chase them down. Especially for two-handed builds where all your weapons have below average dodge status, mobility boosting options become even more valuable.
Best choice if you prefer the style where you consistently manoeuvre your way around enemies for advantageous position, or if you need more mobility in general for two-handed builds.
Appendix 1: Career Skill Cooldown and Cooldown On Hit/Damage Taken Table
Career
Career Skill Cooldown
(seconds)
Cooldown on hit
(seconds per hit)
Cooldown on damage taken
(seconds per damage taken)
Mercenary
90
0.5
0.5
Huntsman
90
0.3
0.4
Foot Knight
30
0.25
0.5
Grail Knight
60
0.25
0.25
Ranger Veteran
120
0.3
0.3
Ironbreaker
120
0.25
0.5
Slayer
40
0.5
0.1
Outcast Engineer
60/90
0
0
Waystalker
80
0.35
0.3
Handmaiden
20
0.25
0.5
Shade
70
0.5
0.2
Sister of the Thorns
40
0.3
0.4
Witch Hunter Captain
90
0.5
0.2
Bounty Hunter
70
0.25
0.3
Zealot
60
0.5
0.2
Warrior Priest of Sigmar
70
0.25
0.25
Battle Wizard
50
0.25
0.5
Pyromancer
50
0.25
0.3
Unchained
120
0.25
0.5
Necromancer
110
0.25
0.25
Appendix 2: Execute Temporary Health Table
Enemy
Temporary Health gain
Skaven Slave
1
Clan Rat/Explosive Loot Rat
2
Storm Vermin/Plague Monk/Skaven Specials/Loot Rat
8
Fanatic/Ungor
1.5
Marauder/Gor/Ethereal Skeleton (Shield)
3
Life Leech/Blight Stormer
10
Mauler/Savage/Bestigor/Wargor/Ethereal Skeleton (Hammer)
15
Chaos Warrior
30
Chaos Warrior with Shield
35
Boss/Lord
50