Berserker

Berserker
Regular Emergency
Fast and fearless, strikes terror even into allies.
Main Stats
Type	Psycho
Rarity	Exclusive
Health 50 Melee Damage 9
Crit. Chance	10%
Crit. Damage	10%
Speed	16
Prepare Time	13s
Rage Cost	13
Behavior Stats
Agility	60
Aggression	85
Detection Range	80
Agility Penalty	10%
Aggression Penalty	10%
Morale Stats
Charisma	-300
Valor	9999
Charisma Radius	120
Abilities
Perks
Special Ability	Crit. Chance is increased by 50% whenever Health drops below 100%
Unlock Requirements
Price	925 (Circus Pack)
Player Level	Any

Berserker is an insane killer armed with a pair of bloody meat cleavers and is dressed in black pants and a yellow mask with a crudely drawn smile. He is covered in many tattoos and has a blue-dyed mohawk.

Climber is Berserker's first exclusive skin. He is armed with a pair of red ice picks and dressed in a red rescue jacket, black pants, brown shoes, a black beanie, and a pair of snow goggles with orange lens. He carries a black backpack.

He can be purchased from the Circus Pack alongside Saw and Queen for 925 money.

Overview

Berserker is a Psycho that functions similar to a Fighter. He has average stats for the latter class, and has overall fast attack speed, with criticals being landed slightly quicker than regular attacks. Berserker follows a unique pattern: when triggering a regular attack, he always does two swings that can't be interrupted.

Berserker's negative charisma causes him to inspire fear into his teammates. Simulataneously, he has extremely high valor, making him technically immune to the debuff.

Some time after dying, Berserker will turn into a Zombie.

Perks and Abilities

Berserker's special ability adds 50% to his crit. chance while his health isn't full.

Considering that his critical hits are faster than his normal swings, this is a very helpful ability for Berserker. It also synergizes extremely well with Psychos 2/2, due to letting him deal constant crits.

Gameplay

Main Campaign

Berserker is a strong melee unit, with a combination of extremely fast attack speed and double attacks when attacking regularly that grants Berserker some of the highest DPS in the game among melee units, making him very efficient at shredding high health enemies and destroying the barricade quickly. Since both strikes deal the same documented damage, he deals double the damage in approximately the same attack interval as most other melee units. Although his critical hit isn't a double attack, it is not a hindrance as it comes out extremely quick, more so than his usual double attack. Essentially, his regular attack deals the same amount as a crit would while his actual critical hit does the same only much faster. His offensive capability is further complimented by his unique fear immunity perk, making him an excellent choice to spearhead through a large horde alone.

It is recommended not to have a large number of units on the battlefield at once since the Fear debuff can actually hinder other units' total DPS, and Charisma will be nullified if too many Berserkers are on the battlefield. As Berserker uses rage instead of courage, it can't be the first unit to be sent out in a mission since rage can only be replenished by killing enemies. This is problematic since range units take some time to prepare until other units are already out and dealing with the enemies, especially considering that Berserker acts in the vein of a generic fighter without any perks besides psycho. Despite this, he can still be used as a support fighter while another melee unit acts as the focus of vice versa. Additionally, given enough rage points, Berserker works well with fellow units with the Psycho trait such as Saw and Queen given that they will be immune to fear, though making room for rage abilities such as the Turret can prove necessary in the late-game making the combination less useful. Nevertheless, Berserker still works well for gathering rage with help from the 2/2 Psycho team power.

Skirmish

In Skirmish, Berserker is a mediocre unit to use in most teams due to his lack of bullet resistance. Although he has high health, it is unlikely to be taken advantage of as most widely used ranged units can swiftly kill him. His only advatnage is that he and Saw are the cheapest units available in this mode, costing only 5 rage points if given the maximum cost reduction items. Therefore, he can be used for an expendable role, like triggering the Boss' effect, should the team formation allow for that. It's also possible to utilise his fear perk as a temporary debuff against frontline opponents, particularly Mechanic. Although, this approach is an obvious double-edged sword, since Berserker's teammates will likely fall under the effect of the debuff too.

Item Sets

Because of Berserker's natural focus on critical attacks, Gentleman proves to be the best option for him in PvE. Gambling can also be useful for Berserker when he is used as a member of 2/2 Psychos. However, it becomes irrelevant once his SA is unlocked, as it functions exactly the same but is more generous with its buff and activation condition. Boss allows Berserker to see use as a support unit in context of Skirmish.

Cost reduction is one of the key buffs for Berserker, as it boosts his playability exponentially. In context of regular missions, -4 to -5 reduction is usually enough, as it also allows Berserker to have other stats at adequate values. Full reduction is usually only recommended for Skirmish, as it can leave him without enough damage / health, and is often an overkill if Berserker is used in 2/2 Psychos.

Crit. chance books are the best choice for Berserker, as they allow him to properly capitalize on his crit-focused roles. +% Health is a tolerable alternative in context of Skirmish. Berserker receives most benefit from flat buffs, since his base stats are relatively low. However, once his level is in double digits, he can meaningfully benefit from percentage buffs to health. Like with most melee units, Berserker gets most use out of prep. time watches, with agility bonuses acquired as secondary buffs. Extra decreases to preparation time can also prove useful, usually in synergy with cost reduction.

Skins and Synergies

Name	Berserker	Climber
Skin
Unlock Req.	-	300 money
Team	Psychos	Emergency

Berserker has proven to be the crucial memeber of all the teams he is a member of. He is one of the key units for Psycho's 2/2 and 3/3 powers due to his frequent critical hits, and is the best pair to Saw for the sake of accumulating rage. Meanwhile, he is important for the Emergency team due to fulfilling a niche of a spammable fighter, since all other units on the team have high courage cost.

Trivia

• Thanks to his special ability, Berserker is one of the few units who can reach 100% critical rate.
• Berserker is the only unit that used to be available as a reward from an exclusive event to be turned into a premium unit. He was replaced with Turbo for the updated version of Halloween Event. Before update 2.9.0, Berserker was obtainable for free in the old version of said event by collecting a set amount of pumpkins throughout all of the player's attempts.
  • In 2017, the required amount was 1,000 pumpkins, and in 2018, it was lowered to 500.
• Berserker's design was inspired by some members of the Smileys, one of the gangs from the stealth-action horror game Manhunt.