And this is a load of bull.
A greatsword outreaches my poleaxe on 3/4 swings, and has overall higher reach.
The shitty bonus length on the animations in compensated by longer weapon length... Which is a disadvantage since high length + high weight on your weapon makes you run much slower.
And last time I checked, poles and 2h have roughtly equal damage apart from the stab. But then the polestab is outclassed by far by the 2h. And having a high-damage 2h stab would make playing pikeman as a 2h even more profitable.
And you constantly proclaim that poles have higher speed than 2h... Which from my POV is also total bull. Sure the Glavie has fucked up animations due to it's extreme length, but it is definitively slower than the GS's. Unless you got statistics to back that (imo) bullshit statement, then why should anyone believe you?
One thing I can agree about is the weight, where poles tend to beat 2h just, making for a pole advantage there. But I'd gladly have the weight "nerfed" to 2h levels since that would make me run faster.
Oh, and polestagger is bs yes.
Not at all wanting to turn this into a 2h vs polearm discussion -
and I personally have no problem with poles except for the strange stagger effect (on the contrary I really like them) - but I think what BM was referring to when he mentioned higher damage output on polearms was weapons such as Long War Axe (44 cut), Great Long Axe (45 cut), Great Long Bardiche (46 cut), Poleaxe (31 pierce) and the German Poleaxe (42 cut). But yes, these values are only slightly higher than what you find on top tier 2handers. Concerning reach and speed I agree it seems somewhat balanced between the two weapon classes though weight comes out in favour of the polearms (despite perhaps not being to your personal taste); when the difference is only a point or two it makes only a slight difference for movement but a World of difference when it enables a player to stun his opponent's weapon.
But the major advantage of polearms over 2handers is the animations. Sure, 2h animations might be more fluid and seem more natural to most players, but not so for any experienced polearm wielder and mostly not so for their opponents. Other than that polearm animations are in my opinion, and I think most other players', not as well-made as 2h animations, and it often looks like they are skipping frames (like most WB weapons but more so), especially when wielded by players with a fast, twitchy style. Stabs are the worst of course, here the character will lean slightly backwards while doing a thrust animation that can be exploited to be worse or at least equal to the infamous lolstab that 2handers used to have before it thankfully was nerfed. Running (even jumping) backwards and about while doing these comical, 360 degrees lolstabs again and again is utilized by many 'top-tier' polearm users, though there's nothing new about it; this is how it has always been since the first MP version of WB, but before the polestagger it all seemed to add up somewhat.
