Persona zeushammer

The Persona Zeushammer is a melee weapon added by the Royalty DLC that emits an EMP upon hitting a target. It is the persona weapon variant of the zeushammer.
== Acquisition ==
Persona zeushammers cannot be crafted. Instead, they can be purchased from any combat supplier or war merchant, at Empire faction bases, or obtained as a quest reward.
They can also be found on the following raider kinds:
Raider Kind 	Chance	Average Quality	Health
Imperial Citizen	? 	? 	100%
Stellic Warden 	? 	Excellent 	100%
Knight/Dame 	? 	Excellent 	100%
Praetor 	? 	Excellent 	100%
Baron/Baroness 	? 	Excellent 	100%
Count/Countess 	? 	Excellent 	100%
Duke/Duchess 	? 	Excellent 	100%
Consul 	? 	Excellent 	100%
Stellarch 	? 	Excellent 	100%
== Summary ==
=== Other ===
When a zeushammer hits with its head, its deals 9 EMP damage in addition to its base damage. No EMP damage is inflicted by the handle attack. Unlike its normal damage, the EMP damage does not scale with quality. EMP damage does not deal physical damage. Instead, it stuns turrets, mechanoids, and mortars for 4.5 seconds. After being stunned, mechanoids become "Adapted" and gain immunity against further stuns for . Immunity is applied on stun, and the duration is not extended by stunning an already adapted mechanoid. EMP also disables shield belts, causes brain shock on humanoids with brain implants, and vomiting on those with certain stomach implants.
== Analysis ==
Persona zeushammers boast a significantly higher than the non-persona zeushammer or monosword, and can only be used by a single pawn unless they have the Freewielder trait.
Due to adaptation, using a zeushammer actually becomes counterproductive when fighting mechs along with EMP grenades or another source of EMP. All other sources of EMP stun for much longer, and the first stun causes adaptation immediately. The zeushammer retains its niche against turrets, as well as certain other uses of EMP (like breaking shield belts).
=== Compared to persona monoswords ===
*For the sake of comparison, the zeushammer's EMP is completely ignored. See the main analysis section for how it is both good and bad.
The persona monosword is the zeushammer's main competitor for best melee weapon. A monosword of the same quality will have a higher raw . However, this is not the entire story. The main differences between the monosword and zeushammer are derived from their damage types: Sharp vs. Blunt. This goes beyond the usual advice of "most expected targets have much less Blunt armor than they do Sharp". Unless fighting against the empire's absolute best soldiers, both weapons' are so high that armor is not a concern.
Especially at high qualities, persona zeushammers have 2 key advantages over monoswords:
#One-shot potential. Zeushammers attack slower, but deal more damage per hit. A masterwork zeushammer deals just under 45 damage per swing. Note that, due to body part protection mechanics, the zeushammer cannot actually one-shot the torso, the largest body part (usually). It can still destroy large body parts like the head, arms and legs.
#Overkill mechanics. If a monosword would cleanly stab off a finger, the zeushammer will smash the finger and destroy the arm in the process. While the monosword's Cut damage type can spread throughout multiple body parts, it is inferior to the zeushammer as it is less concentrated on any specific part.
While blunt damage won't cause bleeding wounds, the zeushammer is likely to destroy body parts that it hits, which will cause bleeding anyway.
Therefore, the following comparisons can be made:
* At normal quality, these factors aren't too noticeable. With a normal quality persona monosword / zeushammer, the monosword edges out against most raiders you'll see, but loses against empire cataphracts due to their sharp armor. The zeushammer, while unable to one-shot humans, can take out many body parts in 1 hit. This results in roughly similar performance against humans. Monoswords are definitely superior against larger targets, where organ destroying is no longer a factor. Ironically, this means that swords are better against centipedes.
* But at high quality, the damage spread becomes very important. A masterwork persona zeushammer is better against non-tough humans - regardless of armor - and human-sized pawns like the scyther. This is due to a combination of overkill mechanics and the ability to one-shot, even if not from torso damage. Persona monoswords of the same quality are better against larger pawns like elephants and centipedes. As these pawns are unable to be one-shot nearly as easily, the monosword's wins through its superior base DPS.
These differences are heavily exacerbated by the Strong melee damage gene, which increases the damage/hit of both weapons. While this means that the high quality monosword can now one-shot the torso, this only makes the overkill mechanics more relevant. A high quality zeushammer can hit the arm, destroy the shoulder, and destroy the torso in the process. 
This comparison is largely moot, as players rarely have the choice between persona zeushammers or persona monoswords of the same quality. A weapon that's 1 quality higher will be superior in almost all cases. It can be useful for relics, which will be a legendary weapon of choice.
== Version history ==
* Royalty DLC Release - Added as Linked zeushammer.
* 1.1.2570 - Can now be detected as intended.
* 1.1.2647 - Renamed to persona zeushammer. No longer damages relations with the Empire without the necessary titles. Previously, a title of Knight or Dame was required.
Category:Equipment Category:Weapons Category:Ultra Weapons Category:Persona Weapons Category:EMP Weapons
Category:Melee Weapons Category:Blunt Weapons Category:Hammers