KF2 Berserker Parry Guide: Parry-Locking Fleshpounds and Scrakes

This is an early-era Berserker guide (the original is marked outdated, so balance may have changed). It explains how to parry Fleshpounds and Scrakes consistently instead of relying on luck. See also Berserker build and the Fleshpound stats page.

Background

In Killing Floor 1, a Medic or Berserker could kite a Fleshpound forever by stepping into its attack range and dodging, which also reset its rage timer. KF2 is different: Fleshpounds and Scrakes have lunging attacks that take a step forward to close the gap, so KF1-style kiting is basically impossible.

KF2 adds parrying: block the hit and stagger the enemy instead. The catch is timing. Scrakes and Fleshpounds have many attacks, each telegraphed at a different speed, so parrying everything from range comes down to luck.

The strategy

Besides the lunges, big Zeds have separate attacks they use when they do not need to close distance. These share a similar timing, so it is much easier to parry-lock a Zed that way. In short: get right up close to big Zeds and parrying gets easier.

Fleshpound

Start the parry almost as soon as you see him snap out of his stagger or rage animation and begin an attack. Done right, the only attack you may miss is his kick, which lands a bit later. With practice you learn the telegraph of each attack and play by muscle memory.

You can usually fit in a couple of hits between parries, because he plays a stationary rage animation after the first hit lands. If you are soloing a Fleshpound on a harder difficulty with several players, one magazine may not be enough. You can parry, back away to reload, or land a hit during his rage animation; as long as you return to his standing attack range you can repeat this until he dies.

Scrake

Unlike KF1, a Scrake is more annoying and dangerous to solo as Berserker than a Fleshpound (unless you use the cheesy circle-strafe). His attack timings differ and the telegraph time varies more, but parry-locking without luck is still possible.

1. Stagger him with the Pulverizer to get in his face.
2. Wait for the stagger animation to end.
3. Start your parry roughly half a second after the stagger ends and his attack animation begins.

That parries nearly all his close-range attacks, and you can then hit him with the Pulverizer to stagger him again and repeat. A couple of his attacks break this pattern and hit almost instantly. The most common is a quick, damaging uppercut with his left hand followed by a few chainsaw swings. If you parry the uppercut a split second late, you cannot lower your block and re-parry before the chainsaw hits.

The best answer is to keep watching his left hand: as soon as it moves, parry. The rest of his attacks are telegraphed well enough that with practice you can react without close focus. If all else fails, ask a Support to double-barrel him in the face.

Multiplayer notes

• Lag: the parry window is tight, so ping can be deadly. Do not rely on parrying above roughly 80 ping. The author had issues even around 30 ping, but those looked like small lag spikes.
• Stagger cancel: as in KF1, damaging Zeds during their stun or stagger cancels it. Any teammate with decent aim shooting your target will cancel its stumbles. The good news is there seems to be a minimum stagger time, and the author was never attacked before he could lower the block and re-parry.
• Teamwork: if the team is going to shoot something, focus on parrying it rather than attacking, since it resumes its attack before you can hit. To solo a Fleshpound or Scrake this way, ask the team not to shoot it and to keep trash off your back instead.

Conclusion

Reliable parrying makes the Berserker much more fun and brings him closer to the other perks in usefulness. The author expected a shift in the meta where one player handles Fleshpounds and Scrakes while the others avoid them (to avoid raging them) and focus on trash, rather than "four Supports holding mouse1 on big Zeds until they go away."