Quick Combat Questions

Xer

Yes. Somersault is identical to Tumble, but goes through faster by a full second in all aspects.

EDIT: So Tumble is 4 seconds normally, and the time for it to go through increases by 0.5 seconds for every broken limb at the start of the tumble. So two broken limbs at the start of a tumble means that it takes 5 seconds to go through. Somersault takes 4 seconds in the exact same situation.

Gamoneterik

I'm a Bard, and I'm wondering if it would make much difference to combat if I got a Soulpiercer.

Stats on my current rapier: 78 / 158 / 235

Stats on a soulpiercer:       90 / 198 / 228

I'm mainly asking about damage, ie. "Does an extra 12 damage increase jab damage much?" I have 15 strength.

Not concerned about the difference in to-hit (Bards don't miss) and speed is a bit more complicated as you have to take into account voice balance and particularly auralbless eq syncing up, so thoughts on that would be appreciated too but I mainly wanna know about damage.

Cheers.

Kafziel

Have you played bard in the last year? You don't jab/auralbless/sing every hit anymore, auralbless is basically reserved for dry tremolo combos in group fights. All that matters IMO is speed once you're at ~150 to hit, and if you're going for damage, intelligence/collar gives you more than strength does. Bards also do miss.

Mizik

I wouldn't bother at all.

Gamoneterik

Why don't you auralbless @Kafziel? Because of pesante? I'm mostly concerned about the accentato and then I'm much more inclined to stick a mental affliction with a venom rather than prefarar. I also auralbless in case the jab is rebounded or parried, then the voice still gets through. Also, I've never missed.

@Mizik thanks for the tip I will spend my monies elsewhere (probably a higher level sash for a start)

Cathy

Gamoneterik said:

Why don't you auralbless @Kafziel? Because of pesante? I'm mostly concerned about the accentato and then I'm much more inclined to stick a mental affliction with a venom rather than prefarar. I also auralbless in case the jab is rebounded or parried, then the voice still gets through. Also, I've never missed.

@Mizik thanks for the tip I will spend my monies elsewhere (probably a higher level sash for a start)

You don't need to target each jab - pref will strip deafness without using 3s eq, and if you have a fast enough rapier, and sing the paralysis one first, your target wont re-deaf themselves until you slow down or make a big mistake.

Gamoneterik

I would also like some clarification on balances... I know voice balance scales with rapier speed... so what about nimble and canticle?

Also, don't the physical and mental aspects of a jab/accentato combo pretty much turn out equal? So 15 strength is equal to 15 int? I recognise collars change that slightly, and whether the target has mental afflictions...

The more I know the more I realise I don't know.

Kafziel

Gamoneterik said:

Why don't you auralbless @Kafziel? Because of pesante? I'm mostly concerned about the accentato and then I'm much more inclined to stick a mental affliction with a venom rather than prefarar. I also auralbless in case the jab is rebounded or parried, then the voice still gets through. Also, I've never missed.

@Mizik thanks for the tip I will spend my monies elsewhere (probably a higher level sash for a start)

I don't auralbless because restricting jab to 3s means it's prohibitively slow. With canticle and nimble and a 235 I jab around 1.8, and my voice balance is 2.6 or something. If your jab rebounds/is parried the voice going through is pretty much irrelevant because you're looking at 1 affliction for 3 seconds at that rate.

Basically I pesante 90% of the time, martellato for prone/acciaccatura for limb prep or sometimes for restore setups. Accentato I basically only use in group fights, and unless you're stacking a significant amount of afflictions onto somebody, the damage is fairly unimpressive. @Xer has some damage kill setups that use accentato, but only after he's stacked afflictions with pesante. If you're using auralbless, it's going to be too slow to achieve this.

Regarding str vs int, the main times you're using accentato (as a finisher basically), the jab is going to be around 500 and accentato could be hitting for ~1000, which means investing in that damage gives you a larger return. If you're just straight jabbing with accentato (which I wouldn't recommend because it's not taking advantage of the ridiculous breadth of the class) then I suppose strength is a larger proportion of your damage.

I'd recommend against downgrading your speed for more damage unless it's like 4 speed for 20 damage, since bard is primarily an affliction class. The potential for smart damage kills definitely exists, and Xer's that I mentioned above can kill me from full health (7k) before I get a chance to stand. That's with 12 str/int, so if you invest in offensive arties you can probably kill anybody in the game with a similar setup.

Riley

I have noticed around voice being 1 second slower then balance no matter what

Gamoneterik

Voice is supposed to scale with rapier jab. If you're getting a 1.8 jab and 2.6 voice you're bugged. My voice and rapier balance are the same with a 0.1 difference I notice with canticle.

My main setup is to stack mental afflictions with pesante and then accentato for the kill, but I have been auralblessing on the pesante so I might change that. Or get a diadem. The auralbless eq recovers a fraction of a second after my voice/rapier so a diadem should put things all in line.

Tesha

Damage bard doesn't use a damage rapier. It uses as much speed as possible and prefarar/accentato for absurd damage. You are either wrong or bugged when you say your voice/rapier balances are the same (I am guessing you don't use timestamps and are assuming they are just about the same. They are not.). Don't use auralbless, watch their herb eating and toggle between pesante/accentato appropriately.

I mean, you can do what you want, but you are probably not going to get anywhere with a slow rapier and auralblessing. The slowest I would go for is 235. I only used my 257 against people like Jhui, and they often just escaped anyways. 

Kafziel

Your experience differs from every bard that's participated in combat (and probably many that haven't) in the last six months, @Gamoneterik. "Scales with" does not mean 1:1 ratio and there is no advantage to be gained by auralblessing every jab/song - you are handicapping yourself here. You're welcome to take or leave my advice as you see fit, I'm just trying to help here.

Xer

... You have a 257 (I'm assuming runed? Please say runed T_T) speed rapier? *Throws down his 235 rapier in a fit of rage*

EDIT: Yes, the above posters are pretty much correct, both in regards to auralbless usage and the fact that jab balance and voice balance scaling isn't 1:1 (I have 1.8s jab, 2.6s voice balance at 235 speed and Canticle up).

Gamoneterik

Alright I'll try removing auralbless and see if my combat gets better. Thanks for the advice guys.

Gamoneterik

Hmmm much better, from what I can tell so far. Auralbless has been removed from all of my combos.

Dalran

Just out of curiosity, I've recently came back from being dormant, It was probably about a year or so ago, and I remember being able to truelock as a monk. Is that still even somewhat viable? Or has curing advanced to where it would no longer work?

Gamoneterik

Can someone tell me why this isn't working? (Yes I know I shouldn't restore in this situation but I'd still like it to work so I can measure up a few different possibilities, and so I can actually get some coding right)

http://pastebin.com/9S5hCt3A

Antonius

The monkmanglelegs function is expecting to handle an event, but when you call it from the restore strat function that's not going to be the case. It will never return true.

Just do the relevant tests on svo.affl in the restore strat function itself or use a new, different function.

Iocun

Dalran said:

Just out of curiosity, I've recently came back from being dormant, It was probably about a year or so ago, and I remember being able to truelock as a monk. Is that still even somewhat viable? Or has curing advanced to where it would no longer work?

It's theoretically possible, given the right equipment and an oblivious opponent, but very unlikely. But then, I don't think it was that different one year ago, so if you managed it then, you might still be able to pull it off.

Niraaeth

Is it illegal to illusion target calling on party?

Jovolo

Niraaeth

Is that a no?

Jovolo

It's controversial. Do it.

Iakimen

Thank god she's a Hashani

Niraaeth

Yeah, you give us no fun.:( Well, besides Kaie, Howdin and occasionally Kafziel, though only during the times I'm not around. (


EDIT: I see you looking at this topic, Nemutaur and no, you cannot raid, you're too much for me.

Kuy

How can you prevent a tumble?

Niraaeth

I know forcing movement stops it, that and a good timed double delph, or double sleep deadeyes, I -think-.

Alternatively, the more broken limbs, the more it takes them to tumble.

Achilles

To cancel a tumble you have to force your target to go towards the direction they are tumbling (they are off balance so dont worry the won't walk out).

Tumble will fail if they are asleep when tumble is suppose to go through. Otherwise broken limbs increase tumble time.

Also important to note that tumble strips cloak so you can brazier them back to you if they are in the same area or didn't tumble into a room with a monolith already in it.

Kuy

Right, right.  How do you prevent it from beginning in the first place?

Cathy

Kuy said:

Right, right.  How do you prevent it from beginning in the first place?

Doors!