20 Questions (Starting with 6)

Hello comrades. I have some questions for our veteran members. Despite having three months and 80+ adventure levels under my belt, I'm still getting to know the mechanical systems of the game.

I humbly beg your wisdom

1. Does Riposte get more criticals?
I've noticed unbelievable strings of riposte criticals (relative to my normal attacks) recently and was wondering if riposte receives a surreptitious boost to critical chance.

2. How many times can I add to a stat with different buffs (especially damage avoidance)?
I use glancing blow, fortify defence, and defensive stance already to good effect (or at least the numbers appear to be good) in addition to full plate armor, and I was wondering whether adding shield of ice is actually going to benefit me? Can I endlessly string together damage avoidance buffs? In addition, are there some stats that accumulate well and some that don't?

3. How many of the same debuff/simultaneous debuffs can I apply to the same mob using different skills (especially fire DOT)?
For example, if I'm using immolation, ring of fire, burning sword, and do sawblade sweep... Will I apply rend DOT and fire DOT in addition to the immolation and ring of fire? Or am I wasting half my deck trying to become an anime version of Taz (from Looney Tunes)?

4. Will I increase or decrease glyph draw speed by adding empty deck slots assuming the number of available glyphs remains the same?
My example: I currently have two dynamic slots in my deck sharing 10 glyphs. I often have to wait up to 2 seconds for a glyph to appear in either when I surely am not out of uses for either. Will opening a 3rd dynamic slot draw from those same 10 glyphs faster? (No slugs, of course.)
For example, CURRENT (all unlocked):
1) Thrust
2) Thrust, Double Slash
PROPOSED (all unlocked):
1) Thrust
2) Thrust, Double Slash
3) Double Slash
Would the proposed deck draw glyphs faster/with less delay?


5. Is it more beneficial to boost one defensive stat as high as possible or is there a benefit to variety?
At present I'm using a lot of damage avoidance and a little parry. Would I be better protected by forgoing parry to take one stat as high as possible, or will I get diminishing returns and would benefit more from spreading my defensive bonuses around?

6. What deternines glyph charging speed?
Some of my glyphs charge much more quickly than others - twice as fast or more. Is charging speed an intrinsic value of the glyph, determined by skill value, or skill type?

Thank you to every one who takes the time to help out a maturing newbie

 

6. Focus
5. boost one at a time
4. Static bar is better
3. Waste
2. ice shield is good.
1. yes

 

Disclaimer : not in game to confirm and so this is from memoru and things can change.

For 2.

I think it depends on the stat being buffed.

For example I think you can only stack 2 movement speed buffs. This kind of was the mail in the coffin for light armour for speed. Dash (air) and a fleet flute made sprint unnecessary.

I seem to remember there being a limit on amount of damage avoidance buffs too, again hurt light armour as fortify defence (tactics) > evasion.

For 3

I think you can stack debuffs of the same stat, but not using the same glyth, that just overwrites. So for example you can't stack multiple blinds, but you can blind and fireflies (with spec) and are stacking a dex debuff.

For 6

I'm never sure with this, different glyth definitely charge at different speeds. For example ring of fire charges much quicker than meteor shower.
I have a feeling attack speed does increase glyth charge time as well as obviously the charged attack speed, but I'm not certain.

Regards
Spung

 

4. I think you get the same amount of glyphs per time regardless of whether or not a skill is locked, drawn, or a combination of the two. The main differences are that the locked glyph is available on demand and can be easily stacked, but also consumes more focus the more the skill is used. Drawing is good for damage spam that you want to use over and over during a fight, and locking is good for more situational things that you want to be available when you need them but don't always want, and also for things that benefit greatly from easy stacking.

 

1. Does Riposte get more criticals?
I've noticed unbelievable strings of riposte criticals (relative to my normal attacks) recently and was wondering if riposte receives a surreptitious boost to critical chance.

Don't know

2. How many times can I add to a stat with different buffs (especially damage avoidance)?
I use glancing blow, fortify defence, and defensive stance already to good effect (or at least the numbers appear to be good) in addition to full plate armor, and I was wondering whether adding shield of ice is actually going to benefit me? Can I endlessly string together damage avoidance buffs? In addition, are there some stats that accumulate well and some that don't?

You can stack just 2 avoidance buffs, like speed buffs, unless you are earth specialzed, indeed earth specialization gives you an avoidance buff from you earth shield that is stackable with other avoidance buff, so just in that case you can stack up to 3 avoidance buff.
If you are not earth specialized I would suggest you Glancing blow+fortify defence

3. How many of the same debuff/simultaneous debuffs can I apply to the same mob using different skills (especially fire DOT)?
For example, if I'm using immolation, ring of fire, burning sword, and do sawblade sweep... Will I apply rend DOT and fire DOT in addition to the immolation and ring of fire? Or am I wasting half my deck trying to become an anime version of Taz (from Looney Tunes)?

You can apply 3 fire arrow, 3 fire fists, 3 rends, 1 immolation, 1 ring of fire, 1 sawblade sweep, 3 fieary decay ( combo deatah ray+fire arrow) 1 burning sword

4. Will I increase or decrease glyph draw speed by adding empty deck slots assuming the number of available glyphs remains the same?
My example: I currently have two dynamic slots in my deck sharing 10 glyphs. I often have to wait up to 2 seconds for a glyph to appear in either when I surely am not out of uses for either. Will opening a 3rd dynamic slot draw from those same 10 glyphs faster? (No slugs, of course.)
For example, CURRENT (all unlocked):
1) Thrust
2) Thrust, Double Slash
PROPOSED (all unlocked):
1) Thrust
2) Thrust, Double Slash
3) Double Slash
Would the proposed deck draw glyphs faster/with less delay?

There are lot of ways to build your deck, opening a 3rd slot with no glyphs in it doesn't accelerate your draw speed but just decrease it. There are some skills that make your glyphs draw faster like chaotic feedback, Spellbinder stance, and Flurry if you have light armor specialization.
I suggest you to use 2 or 3 dynaic slots, and put all the glyphs you have in every slot, this accelerate a bit your deck, also put on the right part of deck all the glyphs you have for example 5x rend, 5x thrusts 5x double slashs.

5. Is it more beneficial to boost one defensive stat as high as possible or is there a benefit to variety?
At present I'm using a lot of damage avoidance and a little parry. Would I be better protected by forgoing parry to take one stat as high as possible, or will I get diminishing returns and would benefit more from spreading my defensive bonuses around?

Cause of the diminishing return and different way to defend from stuffs, I suggest you to use different stats and combo avoidance, parry, damage resistance.


6. What deternines glyph charging speed?
Some of my glyphs charge much more quickly than others - twice as fast or more. Is charging speed an intrinsic value of the glyph, determined by skill value, or skill type?


Every glyph has his own charging speed, some specializations can decrease your charging speed of determinate glyphs, for example life spec decrease your charging speed and casting time of healing ray, healing touch and healing grace, your earth spec decrease your charging and casting time of stone arrow.

 

1) I don’t use riposte, so I don’t know for sure. I know it does less damage when used as a regular attack and lots of damage when used after a parry.

2) normally you are restricted to 2 buffs for things like damage avoidance. If you are uncertain how many buffs (like damage avoidance, damage resist, movement and others can stack, use the skills and watch what happens to he buff icons for that category. So if you cast two buffs that have damage avoidance, you will see two icons under your health bar. When you cast the third buff, one of the icons will disappear leaving you with two icons still. So one of the two previous buffs has written over by the new buff,

3) usually one dot of that type can be applied at a time. However, for fire dots, each dot is treated separately. Thus you can have an ignite weapon, immolation, and ring of fire dot all burning at the same time. Rend is different, you can stack it three times. If you apply it a fourth time, it will clear, overwrite, the first rend. However if you stack 2 rends, in a dynamic deck, and apply it, that is only one application so you can apply two more rends before it overwrites. The best way to see what is happening is to watch the icons under the mobs health bar, at the to0 of the screen. When a dot is applied an icon for that dot appears in the buff/debuff area. You can then mouse over to see what is happening. If you watch the fire dot applicati9ns, you’d see one debuff for each fire dot and each time the dot is applied you’d see that it overwrites the current dot. If you watch rend you’ll see it has three applicati9ns max.

4) Draw speed doesn’t depend on focus or the number of slot they are drawing into, it is tied to the cool down of the skill. What does make a difference is that you add skills to the right hand side of the hi window. This makes more glyphs available to be drawn, increasing how often a glyph appears in the combat bar. So if you have 1 thrust in the draw pool, ie. the right hand side of the window, when that card is drawn you have to wait for it’s cool down to expire before it is back in the pool. If you have 5 thrust in the draw pool, you have 5 chances to draw that card. When you use it, there are still 4 to draw while the 5goes on cool down. It looks like you are drawing the same card over and over, but you are really drawing a different card. If you draw and use all 5 before one comes off cool down, you won’t see that card again until the first one comes off cool down and gets added back to the draw pool.

5) there is a trade off between the amount of xp needed to raise a skill and its benefits. Skills take different xp amounts to raise. There is a spreadsheet in the forums that like sets how much xp it takes to raise the skill. If you are a swordman, ie using blades, there is an excellent post by Sara that outlines how you should spend your xp in the blades tree and also heavy armor and I think tactics. Plus a few other skills. But overall, it’s best to raise skills you use to like 40, then 60, then 80, and then 100. That is a very broad generalization though.

6) charging, cool downs, etc are specific to the glyph. Check the focus tree to see if there are skills you might be interested in. There are skills there that affect how your deck operates. Also the skill tree might have some tree specific skills that can affect charging, coolmdown ,possibly draw skill.

 

I'll try to pass on some of what Ive learned through research and testing, bear in mind when looking up information on mechanics, that things change pretty regularly and there is a lot of old information out there.

1. Don't Know

2. 2 of the same type of buff, you cannot stack ice shield, glancing blow, and fortify defense, the third one will overwrite something.

3. Some fire dot's will now stack 3 times per type, 3x fire arrow dot, flame fist. This is not per person, if 2 people are casting fire arrow it will stack up to 3 times total. Some dots like immolation and fire ring can only be on once, also not per person it simply won't overwrite until it's done. Other effects that stack are also not per source, they are per target, but everything is per glyph, there is no hard rule about stacking.

4. I dont think having more open slots to draw to increases your draw speed, I believe you are actually using all your glyphs before any come off of cooldown. I recommend putting a few slightly less useful glyphs in there to cover the empty spots in a long fight. Even increasing your draw speed will not stop you from running out of rends and thrusts on CD.

5. It is very dependant on what is attacking you which skills you should use. Parry doesn't work on arrows, for instance. It's generally a good idea to balance these things out a bit as you have diminishing returns on defensive skills on the high end.

6. Like dhanas said cast time equals charge time, anything that lowers cast time is going to make you charge faster.

 

Thanks for the advice folks!

A follow-up question: If I have whirling blades in an unlocked slot all by itself with all five in the glyph pool, but it doesnt redraw for 5 to 6 seconds between use half the time and instantly the other half of the time, what does that mean? Is it just RNG taking the piss out of me?

ETA: I never get the glyph fast enough to have all 5 cards on cool down.

 

So your draw deck is random, like a deck of cards. If your draw deck was 20 cards, and 5 of them were whirling blades, then it would have a 1/4 chance to draw a whirling blades for each draw, IF you hadn't used any whirling blades yet. A glyph that is on cooldown is removed from the pool of cards to draw from, thereby lowering your chance of drawing that glyph.

Short answer: RNG but you can "stack the deck" by changing the ratios of available glyphs.

 

All your questions were pretty much answered pretty well so far. I just wanted to add one more thing to an answer that @Dhanas gave:

Dhanas was explaining that you could potentially apply ALL of those dot types to one mob at the same time. That is assuming you could cycle through all of them fast enough to keep them all active together. Some have short durations and won't last long enough to get them all on at once though. And when Dhanas says 3 fire arrow, 3 fire fists... the 3 means you can stack 3 of that specific dot on the same mob at once. If you go to 4, the last one overwrites the first (as others have explained).

But my main point I wanted to make was that you could potentially add even more DOTs to that list... Poison Weapon. You can apply poison and ignite weapon at the same time and apply both of those dots to the same mob. So, if you are looking to add a few more dps you might want to consider learning apply poison and dragging a good poison to your non-combat bar.

 

Don’t forget the Body Slam skill.

 

I am honored by and grateful for the volume and depth of your responses

7. The terminology is a bit confusing, but, as I can have 3 of some DOTs active at one time on a target, can each of those rends be improved by charging/stacking?
Is there a theoretical limit to the amplification/frequency of DOT attacks?

8. Is there much of a benefit to having low number bonuses?
To clarify with an example, is the small bonus to Combat Dodge provided by the leather straps in a suit of plate armor pointless?

9. This is a corollary question: Do we have base number stats for dodge, avoidance, and parry, and if so, do they scale with level?

Thank you again for your time

 

yes. the three rends you're allowed could be one-offs or all three could be 6-stacks.

 

That's lot of blood

... and glyphs!

Thabk you

 

8) is there a benefit, probably not for most of them. For example damage resistance at the end game isn’t as much of a benefit it is earlier in the game. As for combat dodge in plate, I don’t see any benefit since dodge isn’t a main defense stat for plate wearers (damage resist, damage avoidance, and parry are the three main defense stats most use.

9) If by level you mean adventure level, only star, isn’t, design, health, and focus increase as your adventure level increases. Stats like avoidance, parry, resist, dodge increase as skills increase or because gear has those many stats on them. Someone might have base stats, but I would expect them to be minimal. If you create a brand new character, take off all the gear, and do a /stats in the chat bar then you’d see the starting stats. (You’d need to open the chat log in a text editor.) it would be influenced by the starting skills you get when you start the character.

 

Thanks again guys. I have some more questions for the pros and gurus who walk among us:

10. Is there a limit to the number of buffs to a single intrinsic stat (str, dex, int) such as from innate skills, gear, blessings, virtue blessings, food, and skills?
I've learned that I can't improve my damage avoidance more than twice simultaneously. I haven't noticed a limit on strength and was curious if any of you have encountered one.

11. Do offhand equipped items take damage when they're not used to attack/defend?
My magic wand takes an awful lot of damage - seemingly as much as the sword in my primary hand even though I don't use any kind of offhand attack. I was wondering whether this is normal and if there is any way to mitigate this.

12. Can combos be empowered by stacking the component glyphs prior to combination?
I haven't noticed a huge difference between a 4-stack of Whirling Blades, so I couldn't really determine whether a 4-stack of Whirling Blades plus Rend was any more powerful as Sawblade Sweep. It got me wondering about empowering other combos.

Thank you so much for your help

 

9. While I'm not sure on the base avoidance stats I do not think they grow with your level, rather with your other stats/skills/gear. It is of note that they are directly effected in pve by your adventure level vs. the monsters level.

10. No, you can get as much as you can get of a base stat and they seem to be effective on a pretty flat curve, for instance I have upwards of 280 strength fully buffed and it still makes a fairly significant difference in my melee damage from 250-280.

11. Your offhand weapon will at least take damage when you parry, i'm not sure if it takes any offensive damage if you don't use offhand attack, you could test this on a dummy.

 

I don't believe there is a stacking limit on main stats. Obviously you are only allowed to use one stat buff from strength of earth (str), Air's embrase (dex) and Enlightment (int).

No, i don' think so, but you can make a combo, leave it on your bar. then make another combo and stack the combo glyphs you have. So if you have a locked glyph and 2 slots that have the other glyph for a combo. You can drag the locked glyph to each of the 2 unlocked glyphs then stack those 2 comboed glyphs.

Regards
Spung

 

Amazing! A double stack of Quadraslash! I can't wait to try it out. I generally avoid training dummies (disappearing exp pool makes me very anxious), but I will definitely try this when I get home tonight!

Thanks for the advice!

 

Also if you combo 4x rend with 4x whriling you have 4x sawblade sweep, but if you combo 1x rend +5x whirling you'll have 1x sawblade sweep