Wendigo211: I found Rend to be hard to use, because you have to hold the attack button to activate it, which means it takes about a 1s to use it, and most enemies aren't going to stand around while you're doing that. I did use it against Imlerith (?sp), Arachae and a couple shield using enemies though.
Towards the end of the game, I ran into a bug where counter stopped stunning enemies. I would counter enemies and they would get knocked back, but they would immediately resume their attack. If I triggered the the knockdown from the improved counterattack ability, they would get knocked down and I could finish them off, but otherwise it was no more effective than parrying. The problem seems to have been caused by the last round of DLC. Luckily dodging and attacking from behind is just as effective as countering in most cases.
i use dodging against both monsters and humans, and have used it so much that it has become boring. Glitch-free rend would have been WOW. if any of you have run into other serious COMBAT glitches, PLEASE SHARE, it would be thoroughly helpful.
