You stated, "Axes and nothing else are supposed to be a counter to shields", as if you were the lone authority on how the game is supposed to be. I pointed out that this is, in fact, incorrect. You have nothing to do with the making or balancing of the game, so saying what is or is not supposed to be a counter to shields is not your job.
Had you stated it as an opinion, I would not have replied as I did, but you stated it as fact.
Okay, sorry then for trolling you. But I thought it was understood that everything what I write is my opinion. Whenever I bring a fact I tell you why I think it's a fact, that's the reason why many of my posts are that long.
Regarding the CT: I think CT was meant to be a counter against everything, as it doesn't only break through shields but also through blocks and even chamber blocks. The idea was to give the players a "all or nothing"-weapon, and in Native, without custom character stats, it's more often "nothing" than "all".
But the fact that you can push your stats in cRPG brings a high risk of such weapons becoming OP, as players can skill to minimize the negative effects, to benefit of the superior positive effects.
To make things balanced, and to let those weapons work as intended, I would recommend to make no CT weapon under difficulty 21. This would help representing all those "body builders" on the field, as everyone between STR 12 and 18 is only of mediocre strength. Only guys like the German from "Kingdom of Heaven" should be supposed to hit through blocks, to make up for their poor agility. And he would have had at least STR 24 or 27, but probably 36
For everyone who doesn't know who I am talking of, it's the guy in the middle: