Melee Build Questions

Since my last character isn't too far along I'm thinking of coming back for double XP week and doing a new build. It's designed to be a solo farming build that's pretty easy to create and play. I'm figuring for combat I'll go entirely down the sword line and specialize in that, and then do heavy armor and tactics as my other two skills.

I just have a few questions.

1. 2h swords or dual wielding. I really like the style of 2h but if dual wielding is stronger I'd rather go with it.

2. Other than magic penalties are there many downsides to just getting the biggest heaviest armor I can find?

3. If I max the skills I want from those three trees (I feel like that shouldn't be overly hard?) would taming be something I could effectively use with this?

4. I'm assuming with a full heavy armor build I can kiss spellcasting goodbye for the most part, but are there any spells that I should really consider taking? Will I need any special build alterations to make those spells useable?

5. What are your overall thoughts on a build like this?

 

1. Imo dual wield is better in most situations than 2h at high level, but 2h is still useful when you don't need to conserve focus. 2h is also good for getting started because it takes a lot of extra experience to level up the offhand skills.

2. Fizzle is the only penalty, but the trade off between fizzle and armor stats varies. Even if you don't plan on using much magic, you can gain a lot of fizzle for a tiny bit of armor benefit on gloves, for example.

3. I haven't tried it in a while, but as far as I know, taming isn't very practical in general, and even less so for a melee/tank type. They're all fizzle free skills though, so they're at least easily usable if you should ever have a use for them.

4. Even in full plate you can still easily use healing magic and earth buffs.

5. I haven't played yet this release because I just moved, but I have played a build like this for quite a while now and it's generally fine. It's usually not the best thing for any specific situation, but it's decent in almost all situations. It's also good for gathering/farming because it doesn't require much combat expense and you'll have good carry capacity.

 

1.)2h gives you bigger hits and armor penetration, dual wield requires less focus but you to attack quicker to get more dmg. And two weapons that wear out quicker

2.)heavy armor will offer superior defense and give you more strength and a gap closing knockdown. Light armor give you drastically improved attack speed (and skill freqency with specialization) and movment speed but you will be archer fodder.

3.) i’ve seen tamed pets used to VERY effectively hold aggro on groups of monsters while the tamer fights a couple things at a time

 

Hmmm. So I'm kind of hearing heavy armor is less worth it the smaller the slot I have it in. Like for instance, a fullplate chest, chainmail legs and leather or cloth gloves and boots might be an efficient setup?

But one of you says no penalty but fizzle and other other says it affects my attack speed. Is that based on skills perhaps? I'm seeing some attack speed boosts in the light armor skill tree. If I did have a bit of both armor types and train into both armor trees would that allow me the best of both worlds in terms of skills?

 

In the grand scheme of things, you are going to eventually be a mage of sorts, if you want to have an effective character (this is however much later). And ultimately plate is utterly useless. Chain is still somewhat effective, combined with skills that help reduce fizzle.

You can however use plate for quite a while just fine, but keep in mind eventually it will become useless.

 

I suppose that's ok as long as I can still have my heavy armor skills be useful when wearing a piece or two of chainmail.

 

Yes, Chain and Plate are both Heavy Armor and use the Heavy Armor skill.

I personally use chain, because I know eventually I will need to be casting alot more. But plate *looks* way cooler...

 

--- A benefit of the dual wield is that whilst maintaining decent damage the skill offhand attack doesn't cost to cast.

--- As mentioned before, try mixing and matching the armor set to get the fizzle down to a point that suits you. As hinted, start with gloves would bone of leather suffice. Another option to dropping fizzle could be wearing something like the bonesteel crown which adds nothing to fizzle and counts as heavy armor. Skills and a specialisation can help here too.

 

Yeah my general idea at this point has been a heavy focus on the blade and heavy armor tree and suiting up in the heaviest gear I can get my hands on.

For spells I have healing touch, tap soul which I use for post-combat stat regen. Strength of earth and light which I've just been constantly applying (or constantly applying at night for light). And then finally blind. I've noticed blind seems to be really unaffected by armor for some reason which makes it a good one.

I'm thinking I'll just stick with those spells and that general plan until I've pushed the heavy armor / blades thing to it's limit. At that point I'll start adjusting the build to allow for a lower fizzle rate and probably focusing on death magic and that flaming blade ability from fire. Health steal just seems exceptionally good for a high damage resistance character.

 

Post combat, running 2 foods, possibly a buff from a devotional and taking yourself out of combat mode whilst looting might be all the stat regen you require, if u r looking to save some points.
Fizzle rates change with different trees in heavy gear, it may influence which one u choose, but honestly anything is possible.

 

Would you be able to expound upon this a bit?

 

Sure. Whilst wearing some of your heavy gear, mouse over all the skills and see the fizzle rates they have. You would notice trees like air will be much higher than life for example.
So experimenting with gear or putting points in certain skills or specialisation you could make anything viable.

 

So do these fizzle rates change with different material types / different types of armor? Like if I wear copper chainmail I may find sun magic fizzle rates are lower (Because that's what I'm finding. For some reason it says my fizzle rate for blind is lowered by my armor) and if I wear iron fullplate I will find something else will have lower fizzle rates?

Edit: I just checked it over. Sun and Water magic say they are improved by my gear. Moon magic appears to have not been affected one way or the other, and life magic has been MASSIVELY boosted.

Wow man. This changes everything. This means I can experiment with armor until I find a set of schools I really want to use and then be a melee mage who focuses on the skills my armor doesn't hinder.

 

It's not the gear that gives the skill specific fizzle mods that are you are talking about. Each magic tree has it's own base fizzle rate modifier that is the same regardless of what you are wearing. Earth, life, and water have reduced fizzle rates and air, death, and fire have increased fizzle rates.

The fizzles mods on armor itself are generally the same across each type. There's no difference in the fizzle mod of a bronze plate piece vs. a constantan plate piece of the same type for example.

 

also the more points you put into a magic skill the less it fizzells

 

I’m using chain chest 17% fizz vs 34% plate. I’m using plate for everything else and a shield. I use fire sword and immolation from the fire tree. I use corpse explosion from death. I use whirl from blades plus most other blade skills. I wanted an AOE farming build. I use heal / healing ray from life. The key is to level skills that reduce fizzle in each tree plus the focus tree. It’s not bad at all but it did take me several months to build and I’m still at mid level range not high end. Range and mage mobs still mess with me if there are too many. Can’t group them up easy. Also, I haven’t leveled resist skills any yet.

 

I’ve dumped a ton of points into focus, tactics, and sub trees. That’s where you’ll find the casting skills. Also the carry capacity skills.

 

As an Adv lvl 117 Melee Type capable of soloing most of the content in the game I would recommend avoiding anything having to do with melee. A 90 skill level fire mage properly geared will out pace a level 117 warrior in terms of gaining xp with ease. There just isn't any reason to be a melee at the moment with the hit to damage resist and limited range of skills along with the remaining difficulties associated with being a melee. Right now mages hold all the cards, quite literally the advantage in just about every aspect of the game at them moment accept sneak attack builds. They have superior healing, superior mobility, superior kiting, superior damage, superior survival, superior utility and versatility, superior buffs, superior AoE, and the best specializations. For example a properly built Air mage can reach a .6 damage transfer ratio on Air shield. So a hit that would cause 100 damage to air shield will cause only 60 damage to their focus. That's literally a 40% reduction in damage. That's just one example of how advantageous it is to be a mage never mind the fact that that Air mage will be running about 3 times faster than you combined with a Blink that will move them 40 meters per cast every 4 seconds. There is absolutely no reason to be a melee unless you just absolutely want to be a melee, but understand you're going to be heavily disadvantaged even at the highest levels and there is a circle of mages with Chris's ear currently calling for the further nerfing of melee.

 

As a AL 77 Polearm/Heavy Armor player, this is disheartening to hear.

It's also more reason for Port to allow us to buy a second character slot. I don't want to totally retool my character in the hopes that someday melee will be viable again. But a second character slot sure would be nice to play around with Air/Fire mage builds.

 

I find melee swords very viable and would never make a specific build just because it's the most popular due to damage etc. All builds get "adjusted" every so often. I started out with two handed swords and once I gmd all blades skill switched to dual wield to save focus. I stick with bronze chain to lower fizzle since at some point you will need about 80 attunement to all magic schools starting with fire magic and most npc casters will use fire as main magic attack. Level up body slam so you can rush mobs and stun them. When attacking a group of humanoids always kill archers first then mages and finally melee types. Raise water tree quickly to get to Douse and water elemental who at gm drops 100 point heals as needed. To sum it up you want to hit fast, hit hard and hit often. Stick to green mobs instead of yellow or orange mobs and you will level faster. I am not a 117 level mage so I only use magic for attunement and not interested in being a mage. I would rather body slam, sneak attack, thrust and give it last rites while it figured out what destroyed it. Once you get to higher levels you will see the true power of swords and realize why mages want melee nerfed.

I am still a low 107 level with a low 134 bladed combat, 128 swords, 120 bezerker stance and 120 offhand attack/offhand power. I have fun at what I do at my lower level so make your melee build and have fun. If you need some decent starting gear contact @Mac2, he can hook you up with the gear and advice. "Grins as he steps back into his pirate galleon". R/Boris/El Pirata.