Couple quick combat questions

Kayle

So I've been out of the scene for awhile now.  Last time I was around knights just went through their change and alchemists just popped up.  I'm trying to get back into the swing of things and wanted some opinions on a few subjects.

DWC combat ----

I saw a few threads on this but they were dated awhile back. Is DWC (runewardens specifically) combat still heavily reliant on venom setups to either push for burst damage or the lucky torso break/disembowel setup? I've never been one to really fully grasp affliction tracking enough to utilize venom locks or combos enough to really get anywhere except a lucky break combo for some damage. In that sense should I just shoot for a different specialization other than DWC or could I manage low-mid tier combat with just a few venoms and some lucky setups?

On the subject of affliction tracking and venom comprehension----

Is affliction tracking frowned upon? In the sense of using it auto track/select venom combos for my next attacks.  I'm not looking to fully automate my system but I know I do need help in the venom selection department especially in the heat of battle. I tend to know what direction I am going in until either my break setup messes up or I have to switch to fighting defensive. From there I lose track of which venoms to use and how to hinder effectively. I wanted to create something to either echo out what I need to use next or making something that will select my venoms needed based on the fight conditions (target class/afflictions gained or lossed) but not if it was going to cause problems or get frowned upon.

Ask affliction tracker--

Is this script pretty up to date as far as the new classes that are out and what I would need for DWC or should I just look to create my own based off of my own needs. I've looked through the script already and there are some pieces I would like to use but a majority of it I won't even touch because I already have something in place for it (svof limb counter and some of my own general echo and highliting for combat) or should I look to fully integrate the script into my system to get the full benefit. 

Thanks for the help in advance and sorry for any errors. Currently on my phone

Kayle

That was suppose to be the AK tracking script. Gotta love autocorrect

Mathilda

Affliction tracking is that thing that a lot of people do but no one really wants to talk about, mainly because there's a slippery slope down to automation and AI vs AI instead of actual player vs player combat.

With that said, I don't know the current state of AK, and I'll leave that bit for someone else to answer!

DWC is, arguably, the most venom-reliant specialisation of Knights, mainly because you want to stick in the nausea affliction (venom: euphobria) in order to bypass parry. 

I think you should check out the 2-Hander specialisation. It can still use venoms, but the main bulk of its affliction output is "passive", and even then mostly for hindrance. Your main kill route revolves around fractures and damage (and you are very very good at dishing out damage).

Affliction tracking isn't at all necessary for 2H; rather, as I've mentioned, you track fractures instead. 2H is very slow (~3s balance on every attack), but that's all right, because as I've said, your affliction output is passive (based on fractures), and fractures themselves are cured by the health elixir -- so your opponents often have to choose whether to cure fractures or regain a bit of health (and remember, you damage health a lot!).

Overall, 2H is probably the most newb-friendly specialisation out there, but there are a lot of intricacies that make it viable even until the higher tiers of combat.

Dochitha

The available AK script is not up to date, you gotta put some fixes into it, and also make it work for you. I am not sure if anyone is sharing updated AK script...or standalone enough to be ready to share...

I am not expert DWB, but DWC is still pretty much manalock (cos pithakhan), torso disembowel, or damage them out. There are people who you can't damage out. There are people you can't manalock. There are people you can't disembowel cos they check their torso too well...

DWC can't really do a lock but if pithakhan drains mana low enough to stop focus and you stack good enough mentals, that's akin to a lock. 

Venom wise depends on people you are facing, and also largely depends on the strategy you are going. You definitely want to stick illness if you are prepping for DSB, cos parry bypass. Sensitivity if you are putting health pressure, cos engage lunge is scary, they are pretty much screwed if they go below certain health. Clumsiness to hinder, and also par > ast > gecko to hinder off bloodroot RNG. Some even softlock every 3-4 DSLs, pretty good paving for manalock. There are always options, depending who you are against.

A lot of the times, combat is which way they allow you to kill them, rather than you choosing a way you want to kill with.

You are in Shield, ping me, we can do testings and stuffs.

Antonius

Dochitha said:

DWC is still pretty much manalock (cos pithakhan), torso disembowel, or damage them out.

Focuslock and riftlock.

You don't have smash high to force off focus balance like Sword and Shield, but being able to do both gecko and slike together means you don't have to RNG stick slickness first. You'll just have to use a head break to give stupidity at the same time, so you have a 50/50 chance of them curing anorexia with focus. Alternatively, you can try to stick slickness first like Sword and Shield, and do anorexia + another mental on the next doubleslash. DWC, especially as Runewarden, breaks limbs fast, so using head break for stupidity isn't really a big deal.

There are various ways you could go about riftlocking, depending on their priorities. Forged scimitars may make some of them tricky due to the balance times involved.

Kayle

Can you rift lock and focus lock in an arena though? I thought because of the way arena treats predicted herbs you couldn't do those

Antonius

Focuslock works fine, since it just uses other mentals to protect against focusing off anorexia.

Riftlocks won't because the herbs never get removed from their inventory. Except (I think) in duels to the death.

Jovolo

What was the argument against making Addiction in-rift upon consumption in the arena?

Farrah

Jovolo said:

What was the argument against making Addiction in-rift upon consumption in the arena?

It's just not easy to code, afaik. I don't think there was opposition to the idea.

Vallie

DWC is 100% fine in low-mid from my experience being mediocre. You prep really fast, and once they're prepped, it's tricky for them to survive. Once you notice how they're parrying, you might not even need nausea until you're pushing towards the last limb, so you can mostly just use hindering venoms. I swing at 2.1s instead of 2.0 because of no trans weaponry, and basic DSB strat doesn't feel too hard to achieve.

Focus-lock is probably easier to do than mana lock to start off, you'll achieve mana-lock naturally once you're better at keeping up consistent pressure. Most people low-mid you'll damage kill before getting a mana-lock, to be honest. Engage+lunge can be a death sentence if they try to run/tumble when it's too late.

I bound all my numpad to different body locations to swing at - 8 is dsl head, 5 is torso, 1/3 is legs,  4/6 is arms, 2 is impale/dsb queuing (because that's when you're punching them in the dick). Helps me visualize what I'm doing!

AK venom tracking doesn't work out of the box, but it's a good base to build off of and isn't too hard to fix up. Can interfere with other packages you might have in mudlet. You should decide what you want before playing with it - I wanted to be able to quickly swap between different venoms to apply, but it's really not been that big an impact because I don't swing that fast anyways, so you'll be sticking to the same 3 venoms most of the time (since their cure speed means you don't have to track very much). Probably has a bigger benefit if you have L1 or better scims.

If it's something you really want to setup, feel free to bother me, I think I remember most of the nuances? No guarantees since it's been a while, and my use case was to pull venom variables based on conditionals, so I won't be able to help in terms of automating limbs/lock setups. Limb counter is way more important, and learning how to mentally adapt when it's off.

Also will page @Aerek because he loves this stuff, and is extremely helpful (literal pages and pages of helpful) as I've been learning.

Mathilda

I laughed at the reason for numpad 2, @Vallie. 

Kenway

DwC is probably the weakest spec when unartied but very quickly becomes one of the stronger ones (prob top 2) as it speeds up with trans skills and weapon upgrades. It hurts, it's fast, it's flexible.