Blademaster Bashing - Endurance

Manach

I saw in some other posts that people generally view Blademasters as terrible for hunting. This surprised me because my limited experience with Blademasters left me with a favorable impression where their DPS, mobility, and survivability were concerned. Then it was explained that the major drawback to bashing as this class is their "unconscionable" endurance drain with no way built in to the class to stymie it. So, my question is: Would a trans fitness Satyr with a (perm?) Ox tattoo and a max level endurance ring have significant enough endurance regen to ameliorate this problem, or are those combined bonuses too little to really make it worth the investment?

Atalkez

Just an endurance ring makes the problem much less of a headache. Ox tattoo with an endurance ring should alleviate 90% of the issue completely.

The main concern is that bashing isn't balanced around having a multitude of artefacts, and a "normal" Blademaster simply cannot hunt for any extended period of time like most other classes. I'm sure the issue will be fixed soon enough.

Manach

Ah, thanks!
I will probably go that route then but stick with a Satyr just to offset not investing in Fitness right away.

Sena

Manach said:

This surprised me because my limited experience with Blademasters left me with a favorable impression where their DPS, mobility, and survivability were concerned.

Blademaster doesn't really stand out in any aspect. In all of those areas where you have a favourable impression, blademaster isn't actually very good compared to other classes. The endurance just makes it worse, they'd still be a little subpar even if there was no endurance drain. Most classes are better than blademaster in all of those aspects (offence, defence, mobility).

DPS (without Arash) is mediocre. DPS is meant to be about the same for all classes, but that balancing seems to have entirely fallen through so the classes that have "normal" DPS, like blademaster, are well below average. Blademaster isn't the worst, but it's at the lower end.
Survivability (without Mir) is poor. Blademaster doesn't have any especially good resistances or healing abilities, weathering is definitely nice but it doesn't really compensate for having just ringmail and toughness (10% cutting resistance) and being unable to use an SoA.
For mobility, do you just mean dash and leap? Blademaster definitely isn't anything special in terms of mobility, almost all classes are better than blademaster in some way. Or do you mean that blademaster's short balance times allow you to move sooner? That is decently useful.

Really, blademaster's only advantage is versatility. You can use Mir to cripple your offence in exchange for amazing defence, or use Arash to cripple your defence in exchange for greatly improved offence, or go for a balance of the two. The only time that gives a huge advantage though is when you're hunting in reasonably safe areas where Arash isn't much of a risk, so you can have above average DPS. But even then, several classes still have better offence than blademaster in Arash (while also have better defence and mobility).

Manach

Mmm, thanks for the info. It has been a while since I experimented with one and the last time I did it was to a limited degree. I found I cleared areas about as quickly as I did with a monk or faster, which I have always considered to have good hunting capabilities. This was before the damage changes and heavy nerfs to BM though, and not in high level areas.

The only classes I have hunted to Dragon or close to Dragon with are Magi, Monk, and Shaman, and I found all three of them to be fairly easy. Shaman was more work and squishier than the other two but (at the time) capable of very high DPS. No idea really what it's like now with the reworks.

I might give up my idea to bash with a Blademaster or I might just buy enough Arties to improve damage and defense. Anyway, thanks again.

Atalkez

I bashed to Dragon with no endurance ring. Mainly defensive arties and a level 3 band. 

Band makes a huge difference overall, imo.

Manach

Good to know.

I was thinking definitely band, probably sip/regen, and maybe str/con items if I have the credits left over. Not sure what I'm sitting on now. Oh, and crit pendant because why not.

Atalkez

   134336  a ring of endurance                  N/

   202932  an Amulet of the Will                N/

   270117  a Ceylonese ring                     N/A

   285403  a Ceylonese bracelet                 N/A

   291479  a hunter's belt                      N/A

   384481  Waking Echo                          a two arts sword

   408006  a pair of eagle's wings              N/A

   420533  a blood pendant                      N/A

   463192  a glittering ring of vitality        N/A

 

This is what I have in terms of Blademaster bashing. Band is level 3.

Belus

Manach said: Oh, and crit pendant because why not.

Isn't that one of the most important arties for bashing at high level? (much more so than +str)

I don't have personal experience on that front, it's just the impression I've taken from reading.

Manach

Yeah, I would say so.

Trevize

As a dragon with a crit pendant, who has run all the numbers on crit damage, yes. On top all all other factors, battlerage crits (and isn't increased by str/band/etc).

The level one is a must-buy if you focus on bashing. Level two is still good, level three starts to get iffy (other lower level arties outvalue it).

Manach

Yeah, that's what I experienced with my Magi. Level 2 was plenty good enough and now with traits, if you have lucky or aim to kill or whatever it is, more credits for a very slight increase in what is already good crit seems like a waste.

Trevize

Manach said:

Yeah, that's what I experienced with my Magi. Level 2 was plenty good enough and now with traits, if you have lucky or aim to kill or whatever it is, more credits for a very slight increase in what is already good crit seems like a waste.

Don't get me wrong. It's absolutely sick. The following percents is base+crit damage averaged. (100% would be 'normal' no-crit damage).

Dragon, lucky (so not in dragonform), no pendant: 243.54%

Dragon, lucky, L3 pendant, 308.73%.

A 26.77% damage increase. That helps battlerage.

made some edits for clarity

Trevize

To summarize and add to the previous post: the more your base crit rate, the -more- increases help. Not less.

Every level you gain with one means a larger increase from it.

Manach

Sure. That makes sense. I have had a level 3 pendant on one character, though I didn't track the numbers very diligently, but overall, given that there were other things I didn't have, it seemed like it wasn't the optimal buy.

Gamden

I bashed my way to dragon as a Horkval in Mir stance
A solid tank, I gave way to speed but I did not die too often

Made small xp targets each day. The slowness never bothered my cause my only other referance to bashing was a back in the day grook Magi..who got killed alot

I got a crit pendant,hunters belt, Vitality ring and a level one band (all level 1)

Eld

Gamden said:

I bashed my way to dragon as a Horkval in Mir stance
A solid tank, I gave way to speed but I did not die too often

Made small xp targets each day. The slowness never bothered my cause my only other referance to bashing was a back in the day grook Magi..who got killed alot

I got a crit pendant,hunters belt, Vitality ring and a level one band (all level 1)

Depending on how long ago that was, Mir may have been much more viable, since for a long time stances didn't affect damage to denizens (which is why everyone used to bash in Thyr). That was fixed around the end of 2012. And even before the rebalancing last year, it probably would have been at least a bit better, since blademaster seems to have gotten a bit overnerfed.

Eld

Manach said:

Sure. That makes sense. I have had a level 3 pendant on one character, though I didn't track the numbers very diligently, but overall, given that there were other things I didn't have, it seemed like it wasn't the optimal buy.

No need to track crits to figure out the effect of a pendant, you can just calculate it. Crit rate for a given level is ((level-25)/100)^3, capped at level 99. Pendants add .02 per level, lucky adds .005, and I think human is about the same (not 100% sure on that). If your crit rate is x and your DPS without crits is d0, your average DPS with crits is

d = d0*((1-x)*(1 + 2x + 4x^2 + 8x^3 + 16x^4) + 32x^5)

A level 1 pendant, with no other crit bonuses, increases DPS by about 3.7% at level 80, 5.5% at 90, and ~7.9% at 99. A level 1 band, on the other hand, gets you about a 10.5% increase in DPS from regular attacks, but not Battlerage. If I'm not horribly mistaken about the numbers, Battlerage only accounts for 25-30% of your DPS, so a level 1 band still gets you somewhere around a 7.5% increase overall, other things held equal. So I'd say a level 1 band is better than a level 1 crit pendant until you're very close to dragon.

Manach

Yeah. I meant more tracking how the increase in damage between a level 2 and level 3 pendant affected the bashing experience overall (clear time, max hunt duration, damage taken, xp/hour, deaths, etc). I think - at the time - defensive Artefacts would have done more for me than an upgraded pendant. Now, with Blademaster, and Battlerage, the situation is completely different. Thanks for the maths though!

Trevize

Eld said:

Manach said:

Sure. That makes sense. I have had a level 3 pendant on one character, though I didn't track the numbers very diligently, but overall, given that there were other things I didn't have, it seemed like it wasn't the optimal buy.

No need to track crits to figure out the effect of a pendant, you can just calculate it. Crit rate for a given level is ((level-25)/100)^3, capped at level 99. Pendants add .02 per level, lucky adds .005, and I think human is about the same (not 100% sure on that). If your crit rate is x and your DPS without crits is d0, your average DPS with crits is

d = d0*((1-x)*(1 + 2x + 4x^2 + 8x^3 + 16x^4) + 32x^5)

A level 1 pendant, with no other crit bonuses, increases DPS by about 3.7% at level 80, 5.5% at 90, and ~7.9% at 99. A level 1 band, on the other hand, gets you about a 10.5% increase in DPS from regular attacks, but not Battlerage. If I'm not horribly mistaken about the numbers, Battlerage only accounts for 25-30% of your DPS, so a level 1 band still gets you somewhere around a 7.5% increase overall, other things held equal. So I'd say a level 1 band is better than a level 1 crit pendant until you're very close to dragon.

The damage is more, but the value differs since there's also the cost to consider.

Trevize

Manach said:

Yeah. I meant more tracking how the increase in damage between a level 2 and level 3 pendant affected the bashing experience overall (clear time, max hunt duration, damage taken, xp/hour, deaths, etc). I think - at the time - defensive Artefacts would have done more for me than an upgraded pendant. Now, with Blademaster, and Battlerage, the situation is completely different. Thanks for the maths though!

Even as a dragon, I adore my SoA, belt, bracelet, sip ring, and regen rings.

SoA is out for BM, but the rest is still viable.

Eld

Trevize said:

Eld said:

Manach said:

Sure. That makes sense. I have had a level 3 pendant on one character, though I didn't track the numbers very diligently, but overall, given that there were other things I didn't have, it seemed like it wasn't the optimal buy.

No need to track crits to figure out the effect of a pendant, you can just calculate it. Crit rate for a given level is ((level-25)/100)^3, capped at level 99. Pendants add .02 per level, lucky adds .005, and I think human is about the same (not 100% sure on that). If your crit rate is x and your DPS without crits is d0, your average DPS with crits is

d = d0*((1-x)*(1 + 2x + 4x^2 + 8x^3 + 16x^4) + 32x^5)

A level 1 pendant, with no other crit bonuses, increases DPS by about 3.7% at level 80, 5.5% at 90, and ~7.9% at 99. A level 1 band, on the other hand, gets you about a 10.5% increase in DPS from regular attacks, but not Battlerage. If I'm not horribly mistaken about the numbers, Battlerage only accounts for 25-30% of your DPS, so a level 1 band still gets you somewhere around a 7.5% increase overall, other things held equal. So I'd say a level 1 band is better than a level 1 crit pendant until you're very close to dragon.

The damage is more, but the value differs since there's also the cost to consider.

True, I had them at the same price in my head for some reason. Of course, it also depends on whether you pvp at all.