Just thinking about it. They supposedly completely outclass BOTH the original 4, AND the PSQ Vault Hunters, both of whom were ultimate badass Vault Hunters in their own right. They are capable of downing Nisha and Wilhelm, both of whom are absolute juggernauts ON THEIR OWN, as well as Aurelia, with only Axton and Gaige needed to hunt her. (Though I guess to be, thats 4-5 on 1)
It seems like the pecking order goes
BL1 VHs<PSQ VHs<BL2 VHs.
Were they meant to all be about equal, or did Gearbox really intend the BL2 VHs to be the physical gods that they seem to be in comparison to the other vault hunters?
Wilhelm was probably poisoned and Nisha hadn’t practiced in a while. They probably weren’t going to fight Aurellia, maybe she wanted to get out of her turbo-mansion. BL1 vault hunters are the strongest as Lilith can teleport whole cities, Mordecia can one shot the highest level enemies from long distances, and Brick physical strength is unmatched. Bl1> BLTPS > BL2 is what it seems to me.
Gear isn’t a factor here, neither is difficulty scaling.
I mean just that like, Wilhelm could solo the original Vault Hunters, which is more believable once we actually see his skill trees in PSQ, but even poisoned, the BL2 VH’s steamroll him to the shock of all. Then the same for Nisha. Going by PSQ she should have been a raid boss all on her own but the BL2 VHs roll through her like its nothing.
Don’t forget that the BL2 Vault Hunters mortally wounded The Warrior (a borderline god from Eridian origin who was said to be able to cleanse the world in fire) with literally no assistance other than a single moonshot blitz after the fight.
A cocky ex-Dahl Soldier.
A Skinny Poet-Ninja.
A Gassy Siren.
A Roided-out Dwarf.
An 18 Year old Tech-Geek.
And a mentally conflicted Puke Green Psychopath.
All killed what’s basically an Ancient Fire God with a laser firing tail…
The problem with BL2 is we never see the original Vault Hunters using their full abilities while fighting alongside the new Vault Hunters. Never mind using any actual equipment that is noteworthy.
If Brick had access to all of his abilities alongside having the Love Thumper or some other roid shield we should be struggling just to keep up with him. Both Slab town and Heroes Pass would be a snoozefest if he could use rocket launchers alongside his punching.
Mordecai…well…everything would be dead. When he flips his lid after WEP is when we we get to see him use his full potential to what he could do in the past. Wherever he spawned would just be an Easter Egg hunt with picking up all the loot dropped by all the enemies he has killed.
Lilith does not use any weapons so…yeah. If she were using her Borderlands 1 abilities it would of been a Seizure Procedure when she was fighting with all the Phaseblasting and SMG fire.
Roland, in my opinion, is the king of grenades. Give him slag, lobbed Bonus Package, and a bag of beef jerky and just watch the fireworks. His Scorpio turret is not as powerful as Axton’s but Roland can keep tossing it out indefinitely with all of his skills and what with its ability to heal and regen ammunition it evens the scales.
farsight37
(Today, everything was fine in Opportunity and nothing bad happened.)
#11
The thing about Nisha in BL2 is actually a reflection of her skills in TPS. She’s the ultimate glass cannon. She can dish out all sorts of pain but really shines when she’s mobbing; she struggles with bosses more than other characters. BL2’s Vault Hunters would be more like bosses than the average Scav chumps, so it actually makes a bit of canonical sense that they would be able to defeat her (especially if you play with 4 Vault Hunters, as intended).
farsight37
(Today, everything was fine in Opportunity and nothing bad happened.)
#16
I haven’t really specced down the left tree at all, just Fan the Hammer and Riflewoman. That probably plays into it quite a bit. I feel like once I can have 25 stacks of Order that’ll change, but based on my experience so far, she struggles more with bosses than the other characters.
I’m willing to change this stance as I progress further though.
IMO the thing with Nisha is that she was ALONE against the BL2 VH, so it’s not a fair assessment of her powers.
Angel once said about the original VH that “Jack defeated them long ago” and it was up to the BL2 VH to do the job, which they did. so that’s one point for them.
The BL1 VH just happened to be looking for a vault at the same time, and the TPS VH were picked quickly by Jack with the limited resources that he had at the time. while the BL2 VH were hand picked by Angel and Jack over a fairly long and extensive search to find the best of the best using the full resources of the Hyperion corporation… they are the creme de la creme.
They are in fact so tough, that even though he was almost no longer human and could easily wipe out the BL1 VH, Jack thought it was a good idea to use Wilhelm as a bait… He did not believe he could stop the BL2 VH…otherwise he would have just let him do so.
They’re all powerful in their own right. Different sets of skills for different circumstances.
And as noted before, Wilhelm was poisoned and weakened so that the BL2 Vault Hunters could kill him, so that’s not going to serve as a baseline for anything. You could say Nisha was out of practice, or that she never leveled up past 25 (so meta). Claptrap lost all his VH abilities, Aurelia probably wasn’t fought by Gaige and Axton, I’m guessing they just found her and said, “Wanna hunt a Vault? Yeah? Cool.” As for Athena, she does have one of the most powerful defensive items.
Can’t really speak to the strengths of the original 4. I started playing BL1 but it’s kind of meh (don’t kill me). Maybe if they had a greater variety of skills they’d be more similar.
In the original BL, they weren’t as awe inspiring, except Brick.
While Lilith and Mordecai got buffed as NPCs in BL2, Brick got really toned down. He used to be be able to just fly into mobs, dashing around, punching everything to death while cackling like a maniac. In BL2 all he can do is just stroll around and do one heavy slam.