Artifact Blackjack

Kaie

@Eld right right. I didn't mean for it to sound like i was saying they have an unfair advantage. Actually didn't mean to even type that.. I was just getting carried away typing as I thought about how to make the most out of crits. My post was kinda defensive at first, I toned it down. I saw @sena making numbered points like 1,2, and 3. I imagined her weaving her head like a cobra and shaking her finger at me and suddenly it felt mean spirited... so I was like "nuh-uh girlfriend, you did not just disagree rudely"... and flew into Jerry Springer mode. I'm sorry. ;(

I admit! I stopped caring if I was wrong or right for a brief moment. When I'm in Springer mode I don't give a damn if the earth isn't flat. It will be for the next 20 minutes... in my mind.

Xith

There's one other thing (if you have the spare gold). PAY TO PUPPET LEECH SOMEONE WHILE YOU HUNT. (but NOT in the same location)

For quite a while I was under the same "jester hunting sucks" impression. Until I was Level 84-ish and looked back thinking "I haven't hunted very much, how did I get here?" Which is because hunting solo while leeching a dragon that's hunting solo on deathknights and stuff, pretty much catapults you through the 60-80 range. The key though is that you hunt apart, because you get
(solo xp) + (xp as though you were in the same room as the dragon & partied)
instead of
(partied xp) + (partied xp)
Sena's math might destroy my opinion here too, via grouped bashing being faster and grouped priestess or whatever, but either way, it's speedy.

So despite Puppet Leech being generally useless, it's great if you have money or overly generous dragon friends.

On to blackjacks, highly recommend level 1 blackjack. And I lightly recommend slowly upgrading to level 3 if you want to be a career jester. But first:
- SoA
- hunter's belt
- bracelets (level 2 ideally)
- sip ring (level 1 is enough)
Bigger health pool is important. I was Scout specialisation from square one. Had 11 constitution at most, so those arties helped me survive more both in hunting and combat. Once you pass a certain level you can basically shield/priestess spam and withstand almost any damage combo with the arties I mentioned.

Cooper

ITT: I'm going to entirely ignore the hard numbers you've shown me that show I am wrong and go with my very limited experience of bashing on one char.

Talysin

Sena said:

Kaie said:

If you're comparing a level 3 blackjack to a stock blackjack you might as well be comparing a wooden stick to a ripe banana. (1) Stock blackjacks suck terribly. (2) I wouldn't say artied Jester bashing is any better than other artied classes. (3) Most of the artifacts listed are used by other classes as well with a higher damage output.  Sure you won't lose endurance, only your mind if you try taking advantage of that by bashing endlessly. When I toss artifacts out of the picture (because all classes are better with arties), it's not that impressive and I don't think the nerf was a good idea. (4) If you want to bash, just go monk.. or don't trans pranks apparently. I've played around with several classes, jester is not at all my favorite for bashing and it's the only one i've artied up with. So, yeah.. I'd rather play an unartied class than my artied char for bashing. In my opinion I'd rather burn endurance and hit harder than be weaker and bash forever.

1: Without arties, jesters are normal. They have almost exactly the same DPS as 9 of the 17 other classes, they have higher DPS than 3 classes, and worse DPS than 5 classes (counting dragon). The classes with worse offence than jester (comparing unartied) are: Blademaster (unless they can survive in Arash without slowing down their bashing), shaman (because it's not often you can get the full damage potential out of swiftcurse, since you have to wait for shields and move around to find more denizens), and monk (no conditions to this, monk simply has worse offense than a jester with a stock blackjack; monk is a lot better than jester defensively though).

2: Then you're simply wrong. Artied jester DPS completely crushes artied alchemist, artied apostate, artied blademaster, artied druid, artied magi, artied monk, artied occultist, artied sentinel, artied shaman, and artied sylvan, and artied dragon. There's no room for interpretation there, jester damage and speed is far better than any of those 11 classes, if you have a level 2 or 3 blackjack.

3: The classes with a higher damage output than artied jester are bard (with a level 3 rapier they have the same DPS as jesters, but they can get forged weapons that are much better), runewarden, infernal (only with very high-end rapiers, the kind that will cost you 100-200 credits), paladin (same as infernal, though inspiration helps a bit), artied priest, and artied serpent (only slightly better than jester). Those 6 classes (including jester) are all overpowered when it comes to bashing. Jester might be the least overpowered of those 6 classes; but at the same time, blackjacks are a lot cheaper than the arties for those other classes (except priest, maces are only slightly more expensive than blackjacks), so they don't have to spend as much to be overpowered.

4: Offensively, monk is the second worst bashing class. They have other things to make up for their lack of offence, so they're not that bad overall, but they're far from the best.

Edit: In response to your first line, the thing that started this discussion was Talysin saying that artefact blackjacks are useless, and Bluef agreeing. Your first point has been my main argument here, that artefact blackjacks make a huge difference.

@Sena I got a level 2 blackjack and I think I agree with you. I retract my statement! #Numbers

With your 3rd point, do you mean that these comparisons are among level 3 artie holders?

Would you mind providing a dps ranking for bashing by class without arties?

Sena

Talysin said:

@Sena I got a level 2 blackjack and I think I agree with you. I retract my statement! #Numbers

With your 3rd point, do you mean that these comparisons are among level 3 artie holders?

Would you mind providing a dps ranking for bashing by class without arties?

My 3rd point was comparing fully artied (highest level in every artefact that affects their offence), except when they need forged weapons that are better than artefact weapons.

I compared DPS for every class here, including base damage (before stats/arties), offensive spec (unartied), and fully artied.

Bluef

I am pretty damn artied (Level 2s and 3s) and I don't even come anywhere close to reaching the 16 str/int/dex -- the 19 str/int/dex is way out of my range of possibility. This is my biggest bitch about shaman: That I need to spread my stats evently across con/dex/int for bashing vs. PK to the point that these numbers are just wholly unachieveable. This should really go on Rants or even the Shaman thread but sorry I cba. *grump*

Jovolo

You shouldn't really need dex as shaman. It isn't an important stat for them. Just con/int. Con for PvP, cannot speak for bashing but I assume you want int for tjat (or I can't see where int fits into your initial three-way stat split)

Bluef

Jovolo said:

You shouldn't really need dex as shaman. It isn't an important stat for them. Just con/int. Con for PvP, cannot speak for bashing but I assume you want int for tjat (or I can't see where int fits into your initial three-way stat split)

Yeah, INT for bashing. Since I switched from full dex to con/int I am noticing that my survivability has really dropped. Maybe I'm just not used to being hit and need to think of new hindering strategies to offset it though. It really feels like shaman is a class that needs a little bit of everything though.

Cooper

Dex does absolutely nothing for bashing, and next to nothing for pk.

Sena

The thing with dex is that there are a lot of non-stat ways to increase your dodging. Avoidance+riding+speed elixir gives the equivalent of +23 dexterity (with a good mount; though if I remember right, you can't sketch ground runes while mounted, so that can hinder you as a shaman), then if you can afford a major trait slot for it Light Stepper also adds another 2-ish dexterity worth of dodging. So losing out on 2 or 3 points of dexterity isn't such a huge difference compared to that.

It is annoying that so many classes use different stats for PvP and PvE though, especially when they're then balanced (or intended to be) around the same stats. Trying to give all classes the same peak damage output just exaggerated the differences between them, for the most part. They're definitely not more balanced than before.

Talysin

Thanks for the info Sena! The main problem I see for Jester bashing right now is that, unlike other classes, increasing our strength would only be useful for bashing whereas classes like magi and monk get combat utility with those increases. What are your thoughts on that?

Sena

I agree, though artefact blackjacks do help make up for that (a con-specced jester with a level 3 blackjack and gauntlets can get ~300 DPS if I remember right, compared to the normal fully artied damage of ~320 for other classes). Alchemists, blademasters, apostates (I think), shamans, and probably one or two other classes all have the same issue (not using str/int for PvP), but without the extra damage to compensate for it.

I think it might be nice if nearly every class used some offensive stat for PvP. Maybe make str influence limb damage, make int do something besides damage for alchemist/apostate/shaman abilities, make either str or dex do something for jester (if dex, switch bop to depend on dex instead of str of course), etc. I wouldn't want to be the one that has to balance all of that though.

Xith

Also if you have the gold to spare for inks I recommend getting your blackjack runed with Damage and Speed runes (not to-hit, obviously, waste). And gebu/gebo your armor and shield.

Sena

Weapon runes can only be used on runeblades now.

Xith

Sena said:

Weapon runes can only be used on runeblades now.

Oh, ignore me... Not "with the times" yet.

Antreus

@Xith‌
Homie, you can just imbue that shit with a Magi right?

Xith

I can 'imbue' one thing, and it's useless.