Melee fighter builds

Hello

I can't find any kind of updated information about skill/armor setups that others are using. Feels like this community is so closed, that none wants to share anything.

So, what trees, other than the main weapon tree, are you using?
What kind of armor are you wearing? Plate or chain or combination?
What is your main damage source and what comes next? ( for example, I only have polearms, no magic ).
What buffs are you running when you are fighting hard mobs?

Any information is good.

 

I think on one of my videos I show my blade gear, I cant remember which one, might be the dragon. It also shows the skills if you know the icons can tell when I'm doing.

 

Sorry that it appears closed to you. The reality is stuff changes too damn fast lol so anything written is quickly dated.

This will be brief, I'm tired, but it should at least be a good starting point.

I personally prefer swords. Supporting abilities will come from the Tactics tree in the form of stances/buffs. Ideally you'll unlock all of the tactics tree by getting stuff up to 40 so you have the full "tool-kit" of sorts to mess around with. Fortify Defense and Glancing Blow are the two "avoidance" buffs you want to use with heavy armor (Currently capped at being able to have two avoidance buffs active at any given time). Defensive stance is a very powerful asset early on in living long enough to figure out what you're doing. You can decide if you want to dual wield weapons and make the decision on whether to invest in the dual wield skills on the right hand side of the tree or not. Benefits and Demerits of dual wielding vs 2h's so it really comes more down to preference/what you're fighting.

Armor is going to largely depend on play style between Plate and Chain, namely in the form of how much magic you plan on using (The game is infinitely easier with some healing magic). From the sound of it you don't have much interest in playing a mage so full plate would be just fine, just buyer-beware the fizzle rate can be a bastard trying to get a heal off in a pinch. Heal over time spells - Elysium Illumination, Soothing Rain, and Healing Grace - These three spells are very powerful, but take a good bit of skill investment to be effective. The early life healing spells will very much so suffice in the mean time.

Main damage abilities are going to largely depend on how you're playing. I personally use Body Slam to constantly get behind mobs and then use Sneak Attack (Subtlety Tree, near the bottom) and thrust twice. In my opinion this is really the only intelligent way to play melee, but some people enjoy face tanking so to each their own I suppose. You benefit from twice your normal chance to crit from behind and the mobs can't dodge either. Check @Mac2's various videos for some ideas as to deck building. Idea is to keep it as lean as possible with "on-demand" abilities (buffs for example) in locked positions so you only use them when you actually do need them.

There are basically 6 really important "out of combat" buffs worth your time to utilize. I can't pull up the game right now to get the names exactly correct but I can tell you the effect and the tree they originate from:

1) Strength of Earth (Strength Buff, Earth Tree)
2) Dex Buff, Air Tree
3) Int Buff, Sun Tree
4) Celestial Blessing (Multiple resistances buff, Moon Tree)
5) Douse (Fire Resist buff, Water Tree)
6) A "shield" buff - Shield buffs are mutually exclusive so you can only have one active. I recommend Death Shield (Death Tree) for melee, but Crystal Shield (Earth Tree) isn't a "wrong" choice either. Shield of Ice (Water Tree) doubles as both extra fire resistance AND an avoidance buff (so subject to the two total avoidance buffs limit) and as such isn't "optimal" if you're fighting any warrior/archer mobs. However, there are places in the game that are just mages (and Death Shield does very little to help against them) so you shouldn't write this one off entirely.

In general you can pretty well buff 1-3 anywhere and always benefit. Celestial Blessing and Douse obviously need magic using mobs to be effective. The shield spells don't last all that long and take some upkeep in terms of recasting them constantly so if you're not in terrible need of the buff it's also something you can consider not bothering with.

 

Main weapon tree bludgeon, then you only need a armor tree and all magic trees most of tactics and subterfuge and focus.. one class system ftw!...

 

Someones overly bitter.. just cause a melee lvls some magic to benefit his playstyle does not make us all carbon copies of the same class. I would for example never go over 100 in a skill an archer or mage would deem essential because i rather spent that exp in a skill thats aimed towards melees.

Maybe the problem is that a lot of peole copied the archer meta and now complain they are all lvling the same stuff. Well.. duh

 

your first part was right I am overly bitter, the game is built the way I said tho has nothing to do with any meta, whatever that means.

 

Well hello katu. I don't think the community is closed well imo overly zealous to help sometimes.

I always play a 2 handed axe and also healer, but I've been training for quite sometime and get everything I want. I am very much a hybrid player.

I switched to chainmail white awhile ago due to plate is very difficult to heal in and chain is worse now too but still manageable since I have fizzle reducing stats on armor and from the focus tree too.

I love the bludgeons tree for me it's a lot of fun. I'm leveling ground pound now to 80. I just love that skill.

I also get innates like life, sun, fire,water, air raised to benefit from the resists. I have douse, ice shield, healing ray and healing blast locked in some decks since I travel in groups a lot to heal if I need.

I am not shy about using any skill. I love dazzling ray. It is the cutest spell. The circle around an enemy's head is a new visual I love. So I'm not necessarily a build to copy, I usually try out many things.

I don't do archery or death or switch from two handed axe except to heal a group then I use two wands with healing help stats. So I'm gm bludgeons and gm healing ray, I'm also gm deflection and so far that is it for gms that I have so far.

I have lots of skills at 80 too. I'm working body slam to gm and who knows. I'm not very organized but just having fun with hybriding.

So it does depend on what info you are looking for from us. All we can do is say what we do or don't do. I know for me I'm not a serious fighter. I try to get better but my desire to try things out gets in the way. We can have everything so it will take me longer to get it all working best. I'm pretty high level tho because I've been around playing constantly for a long time. So most of all have fun imo.

 

For the OP in short version:
Sooner or later you have to skill almost everything and you will be the "jack of all trades".
Everyone at some point is playing a hybrid build, the longer you play, the more your toon turns into an hybrid.

 

Thanks everyone, I have felt for long time that my character is "stalled", can't get progression, but I started to get those extra heals and buffs up and currently checking out chainmail department for testing purposes

 

I made it my goal to make a viable PVP melee build. If you need help msg me, but I can tell you it won't go without magic. Killing stuff with magic is for hipsters now, so you made the right choice

 

You don't like helping other players, Vallo?

 

Tier 2 (Bronze and Constantan for melee) metal based armor give twice the weapon damage benefit of copper. Obviously more expensive but very much so worth it. Plate has 3 different "flavors" of it (Epic, Normal, and Augmented) while Chain only has Augmented and Normal flavors. Definitely worth your while to get an idea of what each one will end up giving you before you waste materials.

 

Rather than me reposting this here. Mac just posted a really good thread about armor you may be interested in. Very good information

Some info about armors.

 

I been posting very recent melee-focused assassin videos!
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/assassining.103961/


One handed blades (no coup de grace) Primarily daggers for the crit chance so i dont need to focus on crit chance with materials/masterworks

Leather armor with plate gloves and boots. For a small bit of damage avoidance (and soon, health) to go with my dodge. And for speed.

Dual wielded daggers for offhand attacks, thrust, Double slash, Sneak Attack, Silent Movment and poison potions for attacks

Potions/healing touch, Parry, Dodge, sometimes evasion and defensive stance for defense

Sprint, flurry, Chaotic Clone, Distract, Moonbeams, Fireflies, Night Step for utility.



Ranged deck is only speed, fireflies, defensive stuff flurry and Aimed shot. In case i need a ranged attack.

 

When in doubt ask Mac. He is as smart as he is kind.

 

Melee blunt fighter + earth magic here. I wear full plate and fight with a 2-handed axe.

Main damage dealers:
Crushing Blow
Knockback
Body Slam
Stone Fist
Splintering Strike (Crushing blow + Stone fist)
Titan Smash (Knockback + Body slam), really neat attack with long stun. Was recently fixed so it hits multiple opponent.

I have all these damage skills as unlocked glyphs on keys 1-5, then Stone Arrow, healings and buffs locked on the rest. I feel like this is pretty strong, but I haven't tried anything else to compare with.

 

Update:
I'm now lvl 73.
I raised evasion skills to 80 and healing skills to 80 ( attunement still something like 55 or something.. )

I still use polearms and I have GM polearm and puncture. I only use Puncture and Spinning attack, rest of the skills feels useless.

I can now kill everything in Deep ravenswood, spiders, liches, all bears at once. I can get about 100-150k exp, depending if I skin or not and downtime is low ( hp/focus stays up )
I can also quite nicely clear Ulfheim, thou sometimes the 2k hp mages crit badly, but Still I die rarely, but I have quite high downtime if I constantly fight 2 or 3 targets.

Thanks for all the tips.

One new question thou. I play mostly solo, so is the DRW the place to be until Ulfheim turns green/yellow? Am I missing some other sweet area?

 

Wyrmsands elite skeletons and Grannus Colossus end map also gives nice xp , those are nice areas to go as duo too