Quick Combat Questions

Xer

Man, I know I'm up late when Carmain is up posting.

Agravain

Don't keepup curseward, but use it wisely i.e breaks. 

You don't need focus against Shamans, so don't worry about that. (But it does help).

I would not try to sleep lock a shaman, pretty much all shamans you fight will be at least Logosian and they have no active healing abilities whatsoever. 

Anymore specific questions? Kinda vague.

Mishgul

you are a serpent goddamn, shamans should be fearing the crap out of you. one sec let me buy you a thoth's fang.

Agravain

Thanks Mishgirl, I appreciate it.

Mishgul

not you, i hate you

Agravain

Woah, harsh. My emotions.

Iocun

Shamans are close to the easiest class for a serpent to lock. Unless, of course, they know how to bypass icewalls/block. Then you're screwed (as with any opponent who doesn't rely on momentum).

As for curseward: it's a generally vastly underrated ability. Yes, putting it on keepup is a bad idea in combat (although it can be a fine enough thing to do temporarily if you need to go pee in mid-combat - it's fun how well that can work), but using it tactically in fights against shamans and apostates is extremely powerful. Even more so as a serpent, since you can mix it up with curseward illusions.

Kenway

So I've been playing around with FALCON STARTLE and I 'm wondering if anyone knows what the defense is that causes the rider to land on their feet versus on their back. You'd -think- levitation wouldn't you? But no. It's not. Thoughts?

Antonius

Should be relatively trivial to test by starting without any defences and adding them in until you find the one that makes it happen. Of course, I think it may just be totally random; been years since I bothered using FALCON STARTLE, I remember it being pretty lackluster.

Eld

Kenway said:

So I've been playing around with FALCON STARTLE and I 'm wondering if anyone knows what the defense is that causes the rider to land on their feet versus on their back. You'd -think- levitation wouldn't you? But no. It's not. Thoughts?

If the rider in question is a bard or a jester, I'd guess balancing. I don't think I've ever seen falcon startle in action, though, so not really sure how it works.

Antonius

I did some (really, really, incredibly) brief testing, and it just looks like it's random. I got about half and half between landing on my feet and being knocked prone (with an accompanying stun). The chances of each might be modified based on the target's Riding skill and/or mount level, I'm not really sure, but there doesn't seem to be any specific defence that prevents being proned that's available to everybody.

@Eld: You're probably not going to ever see it in action because there are better, or at the very least equivalent, options in every situation you could conceivably make use of it. It dismounts, with a chance to prone and stun, but you can achieve both dismount and prone (we'll ignore stun, it's considerably shorter than the balance recovery) reliably by doubleslashing with double delphinium. It can also be used on targets that are flying, or mounted in the trees (how does that work?), but tentacle does the same thing in that situation.

The only advantage it has is that Svo doesn't currently have triggers for it and therefore doesn't recognise you as no longer being mounted.

Talonia

Which, now that you've pointed it out, will no longer be the case in about seven and a half minutes, so scratch that too. :P

Naisar

What's the heartseed timer now?  I seem to remember it being shortened and I don't have the numbers for the new duration.  Thanks in advance.

Sidonia

It's been a while but I think it's 12 seconds

Naisar

I think that was the original timer, but Announce 3404 sped it up a bit.

Sidonia

I don't even remember how long ago I was a sylvan (1.5-2 years maybe?), but I thought it was originally 14s or something and was increased to 12. I might just be totally wrong.

Cynlael

If it's any idea, my fights as sylvan went something along the lines of

Seconds - Action
1            - Break Limb - They cure
3.4         - Break second limb - Off resto balance for another ~2seconds
5.8         - Get to heartseed the second they apply to second limb
9.5         - Break torso right as they would get resto balance back
~3.5-4s later is when heartseed finishes them off, which is about when they would get resto balance back. - So somewhere around 8-9s.

Wilhelmina

Got no answer in the Quick Questions thread, and searching threads on this forum yields no results, so I'll try here.

Is it better to have more CON or more INT for magi, PvE and PvP? Also, do magi benefit from the Nimble trait at all, or should I go with Quick-witted?

Kaden

Either is viable, I think. Though most magi get int since that's where their damage comes from. You can do fine with just in in pve and pvp (though I've sometimes considered going con for the extra tankiness. Never went through with it though since I figure that I'd want the int if I ever invest in a sash and collar).

Magi arguably get benefit with staffstrike but most of your abilities will be equilibrium dependent, so I'd really recommend quick-witted over nimble.

Mishgul

Heartseed is 12 was 13

Iocun

Oh... my fights against sylvans usually go like:

- They break my limb. I cure. I touch shied.

- They erode.

- I touch shield.

- They erode.

- I touch shield.

- They erode.

- My limb is cured and I continue attacking.

Mishgul

my fights with sylvans are much more complex.

- why is hcp left not working?

- hcp target left

- WHY IS THIS NOT WORKING. IS IT HPC?

- hpc target left

- NOTHING. bah i died.

- AB TEKURA HAMMERFIST

- Syntax: HFP <target> LEFT|RIGHT

- oh.

Jacen

illusion touch shield is so much more lol though.

Naisar

Iocun said:

Oh... my fights against sylvans usually go like:

- They break my limb. I cure. I touch shied.

- They erode.

- I touch shield.

- They erode.

- I touch shield.

- They erode.

- My limb is cured and I continue attacking.

Sylvans are hilarious.  Terrible limb breaking capabilities, their one skill that knocks prone doesn't work against balancing, and they can't punish limb damage so people just apply resto to torso on loop.

Thanks for sorting out the heartseed timer for me folks.

Zael

What's a good race for both PVE and PVP as a blademaster?

Naisar

Dwarf

Sena

All of them. The worst you'll get from choosing a "bad" race is -1 str/con, which isn't really a big deal.

Horkval (for the physical resistances) or dwarf (for the non-physical resistances) would be good choices though. And mhun's extra movement is always nice.

Zael

Alright, thanks and changing race effect traits or no?

Eld

Other than racial traits (the ones you see on HELP <race>), traits are independent of race.

Zael

Ok cool thanks!