Foremost I am not complaining, I am mostly asking for advice. I can't understand why but as a melee only player I have a good understanding of the melee combat and have very little trouble with anyone ( minus bugs/glitches etc. ) until it comes to the Orks. I don't know what it is about them, but ANY unit I face in melee against them is a struggle. It's like every unit of theirs is a melee power house against me and I can't figure out what the problem is. If they have a shield, or power klaw forget about it, I'm guaranteed to die no matter what I do. Shield is absolute garbage against them, roll dodging does nothing because they somehow kill me through my I-frames. I know they have more base health which makes them a bit harder to kill, and it's a pain. Even the Eldar who is universally agreed upon as the power house I have a much easier time fighting ANY of their units in melee besides of course a swooping hawk obviously. At this point I rather face a Warlock then a Shoota.

I know one small issue is I have a harder time reading them than any other race, their headbutt/fast/power attack animations I'm still not 100% sure on. I also main chain sword/power sword with mods. Any sort of information or advice would be appreciated.

Well currently if someone has a Klaw on just Heavy them. Light attack is still pretty borked and chances are you'll go through them as their own Heavy is not reliably usable in any real melee and Dbash is countered by Heavy.

For everything else....just gotta learn the animations. Look for the little glow on the hand for a Heavy signal, Dbash doesn't do that.

Something else you can try is to clang 1-2 times with a fast attack and then anticipate them doing a DBash and instead roll back and then Heavy attack, most people aren't prepared for this.

Take my advice with a grain of salt though, I'm not a melee pro. I die on my Ork in melee all the time but I do decent enough, even with the Klaw.

My power attacks seem to do nothing against them though, and my weapon shatters. My d-bashes also seem to have no affect on them, and IF it happens to rarely connect they get out of it before I can even swing WITH a chain sword.

It's hard to gauge when I'm in close enough distance, I try to roll-p attack but it seems most the time when I do, I miss..barely and opens me up for countering. That is something I do need to work on but the rest just doesn't really work for my GA. One other problem is, if I give them to much distance, they typically take out their hand gun and destroy me. Which I DO try to block but sometimes and I don't know how, they kill me from the front..shield up and at full durability. Also times when I swing and miss, my shield can't help me.

Do I need to start using a power maul or something? It swings far to slow for my liking and I don't see much benefit from it.

I play Ork and LSM mostly, jump assaults predominently on both factions.

Something is up with Ork melee I think. I dont know if its a bug or even what it is but it is a much easier time on my lower levelled Stormboy than it is on my Jump Assault.

The power attack with electrified choppa is insanely efficient attack speed wise which may be doing it or something with the animations but I am generally able to react faster on my Ork.

May need some community folk to get on the UAT and test out the melee difference to see if something is wrong with their RPS perhaps.

Until then don't fight them straight up when you can they will out tank your damage in a near equal skill scenario. As for watching for the headbutt you can kinda see it triggering when they stop for a split second and their arms kinda go out to their sides.

TLDR
Something seems off with Ork melee, not the HP or toughness but feels like their speed, animations or hitboxes are causing weird issues perhaps or feels like it to me as well.

Power Maul is probably the best weapon for a Shieldbro(IMO). Maul breaks damn near every weapon quite quickly. Hits plenty hard too.

If you're a melee player who finds themselves more often clanging then beating your opponent in the RPS system, Maul is the weapon of choice.

Hmm.. the higher point count is going to kill my armor rating now..but I'll give it another shot though. I just hate mauls lol, I'm a sword guy.

I seem to die too electified choppa's constantly, most the time from very few to one hit kills. I think something is in the animations, be it in game or my reflexes against them. It's just against every other faction I'll run into certain classes thinking.. ah yes a free kill. But EVERY ork unit terrifies me at melee range, perhaps something I need to overcome and I'll try the maul again.

I play a painboy primarily and I do tend to do quite well in melee, I've gotten the most melee kills commendation a couple of times, although my urty syringe will break against any strong melee weapon. I usually have to dance around marines quite a bit in melee or risk getting my weapon broken. sucks to only have one melee choice as a painboy.

I would say orks are naturally more melee focused than other races, to balance out the fact that they are somewhat borked when it comes to ranged weapons.

Backing up and shooting them with pistols works every time. Our shitty little bunny hop leaves alot to be desired compared to the marines 50 yard lunge with their weapons. You are just used to the pistol being worthless against the much faster marines and eldar. Clang? Roll away and backpedal while shooting. Watch as they inneefectually flail away at air while you maintain a comfortable and easy distance. If they roll toward you roll back again. I am helpless when this happens if I am a slugga.

I have exactly the same problems, while I usually do just fine against units universally considered overpowered, like banshees and warlocks.
I guess it's a combination of extra hp and imho really terrible animations for ork melee, so it's very hard reading what they're doing AND you need to guess correctly more since they have more life. All this coupled with painboys poisoning you during clashes, so you either manage to kill them fast or it's a death sentence.
Getting better results with power axe than swords (or even better with Rites of Fire, but that's more or less butchering anything short of a rhino).