Curse

Angel Killuminati · May 21, 2007, 07:16 PM // 19:16

First off, Hello!

The thread is based on one question - Is higher strength preferred over higher tactics?

I have just created a Warrior for the 4th/5th time having never really got into Melee based characters and instead opted for support roles using Monk, Necro, Ritualist and Elementalist. As you can see I prefer to cast spells but want a pretty good Warrior.

Having only Factions and completed the game 4 times...(yes I know it's crazy why I don't have any of the other versions,) I'm really stuck as I'm not as experienced in Warrior builds, whether to have higher Tactics or Higher Strength?
It would seem obvious to me that a Warrior needs higher Strength in order to deal damage, but is that really true?! I know a Warrior can revolve around soaking up damage, but mostly a Warrior is there to deal damage in my opinion, and be a damage dealer for the party. But then again I'm inexperienced when it comes to melee characters...so experienced GW heads I'm all ears.

Remembering that I only have factions, would higher Strength be recommended instead of higher Tactics?

What skills I can see working from the two attributes - Factions only:

Strength....

Beserker Stance - For 5...10 seconds, you attack 33% faster and gain 50% more adrenaline. Berserker Stance ends if you use a skill.

Endure Pain - For 7...16 seconds, you have an additional 90...258 Health. Although endure pain is risky, as after the amount of time is up, you lose a lot of health rapidly so you need to take that into consideration.

Leviathans Sweep - If this attack hits, you strike for +5...17 damage. If this attack is "blocked" your target is knocked down and suffers 10...29 damage. In order to do damage to Rangers trying to block.

Primal Rage - Elite - For 10 seconds, all of your attacks have an additional 10...46% chance of being critical hits and have 20% armor penetration. Primal Rage disables all skills for 10 seconds. I'm wary of using up the Elite spot though as an Elite weapon based attack surely is the way forward.

Shield Bash - For 5...10 seconds, while wielding a shield, the next attack skill used against you is "blocked." If it was a melee skill, your attacker is knocked down and that skill is disabled for an additional 15 seconds. I'm guessing is very useful in interrupting Assassins skill chains?

Tiger Stance - For 4...9 seconds, you attack 33% faster. Tiger Stance ends if any of your attacks fail to hit. Similar to Beserkers, but you can use skills with Tigers.

Tactics.....

None Shall Pass - All nearby foes that are moving are knocked down. At 10 energy it's way too pricey for a Warrior with+2 regen.

Retreat - If there are any dead allies within earshot, your party moves 33% faster for 5...10 seconds. Doesn't really help me in battle though. More useful with Paragons if anything.

Shields Up - For 5...10 seconds, you and all party members within earshot gain 24 armor against piercing damage and 50% chance to block incoming projectile attacks. With the 20 second space between recharge, that skill seems fairly decent.

Watch Yourself - Party members within earshot gain +5...21 armor for 5...10 seconds. There's nothing like a helping hand from extra armor but it eats away at your adrenalin, although 4 isn't so bad.

Auspicious Parry - Elite - For 5...10 seconds, the next attack against you is Blocked and you gain 1...3 strikes of Adrenaline. This costs 1 adrenalin, gains more than it costs and recharges in 2 seconds. So I'm guessing it's very spammable...but again should this be the Elite I carry?

Balanced Stance - For 8...18 seconds, you cannot be knocked down and you do not suffer extra damage from a critical attack. I would assume for a Warrior this is decent in PvP mostly as Assassins link their skill setup with knockdowns that inflict poison and of course this stops their critical hits.

Defensive Stance - For 1...7 seconds, you have +24 armor and you have a 75% chance to "block" melee attacks and arrows. Defensive Stance ends if you use a skill. This lasts for around half the time it takes to recharge. Any good?

Healing Signet - You gain 40...130 Health. You have -40 armor while using this skill. A free heal?! Of course this is a must - obviously not activating during battle.

Thrill of Victory - If this blow hits, and you have more health than target foe you strike for +15...39 damage. I would assume if using a sword, then Final Thrust is better?

Those skills above are the only real ones I think should be considered for a Factions only Warrior. But am I right? And is my theory of 'Higher Strength is a must over higher Tactics' right, remembering I only have Factions?

I'm level 20, have max armor, can change second professions at the drop of a hat and I'm an experienced player but only with spells!

I just wanted some advice from experienced Warriors...

Higher Strength or Higher Tactics ?!

phool · May 21, 2007, 08:32 PM // 20:32

For a Factions only player for respectable dps I'd recommend a battle rage, triple chop, dragon slash or auspicious parry build where dragon slash and battle rage are best strength based, auspicious parry is tactics based and triple chop I'd probably play tactics or a bit of both. How comfortable are you with frenzy in pve? As a factions only player your only real alternative is tiger stance (50% coverage at best) or TF, which only really works in otherwise all adrenaline builds (i.e. dragon slash).

The passive AP on attack skills shouldn't really be featuring as a deciding factor it just doesn't make much of a difference, with NF skills (flail, enraging charge, steady stance...) out the way it seems more like [skill]power attack[/skill] vs [skill]"watch yourself!"[/skill].

Stormlord Alex · May 21, 2007, 08:40 PM // 20:40

To be blunt,

STRENGTH SUCKS SHIT FOR ACTUALLY DEALING DAMAGE

With this in mind, the amount of Strength/Tactics you use is determined by what skills you use.
Naturally, you'll max out weapon mastery (you're quick to cotton on to the idea that warriors deal damage, good job!)

The only real decent Strength skill I'd recommend using is Tiger Stance (As a rule, warriors take an IAS to beef up their damage, adrenaline gain etc. Flurry and Berserker's suck, you can't get Flail, and Frenzy... isn't recommended for new warriors. Or Canthan ele bosses).
Leviathan's Sweep is too conditional (and easily subbed in where needed... though I can't think of anywhere in Cantha where this is so)
Shield Bash is OK, but it's rare that you'll be spiked down by assassins. Useful in Alliance Battles, though.

Looking at the progression tables for Tiger Stance, we'll see that it hits the 8 sec. breakpoint at 9 Strength, that is, 8 + a minor rune. Coincidentally, this is the breakpoint for 12 seconds of Sprint, 'cuz speed buffs are cool.

The rest of your attributes can then be dumped into Tactics for all them lovely... uh... well, Heal Sig and Watch Yourself!

So, in short, I still recommend the basic 9 Strength, 11 Tactics, 14~16 Weapon setup for a Factions warrior.

As this is a Factions warrior, I also get to scream
DRAAAAAGOOOOOON SLAAAAASH!!!
As the elite of choice.
Or triple Chop, if you like Axes.

Any other queries?

Angel Killuminati · May 21, 2007, 09:01 PM // 21:01

Thanks Phool. I've read and read on numerous posts that Dragon Slash is the dogs *******, so I'm thinking of going down that road, although Battle Rage is very nice also enabling you to use nice adrenal based skills and 2 hits would make you able to keep it up and active. I guess it all depends on whether I want to use a Sword, Axe or Hammer. I've used a Hammer for quite a while now enjoying the punch it packs on enemies but I know Hammer based warrior builds are mostly centred around PvP and trying to shut down casters and are basically a pressure warrior. So I want to change to (probably) a sword.

From what I've gathered, 3 skills I should definitely look into adding to my sword skill bar are :

Sun and Moon slash

Dragon slash

Final thrust

...with a bit of bleeding thrown on for good measure. I also like Triple Chop along with Cyclone Axe. The last time I had a warrior I based him around those two axe attacks and Splinter weapon, as most of the missions in Factions have nice clusters of enemies packed in.

But my main concern is what is fundamentally better. Higher strength or tactics? Can a high tactics based Warrior still pack a punch using only Factions skills? Or would maxing out strength be better suited? If I had higher tactics you see, I wouldn't want my Warrior to be weak, I'd want him to still own as best I could.

So if I want him to be strong, I'm guessing higher strength is in order as it makes more sense. Or could higher tactics be just as powerful in the long run depending on the right skill setup?

Obviously if I have high strength that still leaves me a few points to put into tactics which I will do. I'm just wondering which one to max out over the other.

[P.S - Sorry if it seems I've ignored your comments StormLord Alex, as I posted at the same time as you and didn't see your post before I made this one.]

Stormlord Alex · May 21, 2007, 09:48 PM // 21:48

Aaah, Dragon Slash.

Dragon Slash + Final Thrust is a HUUUUUUUUGE no-no.
Dragon Slash builds work on maintaining a high adrenaline, to cycle sword attacks. Final Thrust... drains your adrenaline. The two don't sync well. Final Thrust is, otherwise, a godly sword skill.
For Factions only, the attack setup for D Slash...

D Slash / Sun and Moon Slash (or Silverwing Slash) / Sever Artery / Gash
or... against stuff that don't bleed...
D Slash / Silverwing Slash / Standing Slash / Sun and Moon Slash

Also, a wee note - Sever Artery (and, well, bleeding) is, by itself, a weak skill. The damage it causes - 6hp a second - is rarely even noticed on higher-level mobs.
Sword warriors only bring Sever as a means of priming the target for a nice, clean [skill]Gash[/skill] - Deep Wound is sex, knocking of an automatic 100hp from the enemy... And *that* they will notice

EDIT: Now that I think about it though... The only things that I can think of that don't bleed in Factions are the celestial thingies in Nahpui, and the stone thingies in Arborstone.

Angel Killuminati · May 21, 2007, 10:20 PM // 22:20

Ahh ok, thanks Stormlord Alex. That solves 4 slots on my skill bar to make some decent attacks.

This probably sounds like a silly question, but as Sever Artery and Gash require 11 adrenaline total (which is quite a lot) would you use this combo at the end of your attack chain as a way of finishing off the enemy? After pummeling them with Dragon Slash.
Or would these two skills be a good 'starter' once you have gained the right amount of adrenalin using a speed buff like Tigers Stance so that they have bleeding and deep wound, then continue to spam Dragon Slash once those two conditions have been applied? As deep wound (20% health reduction) will affect a character a lot more with higher health. I'm guessing you meant as a lead attack chain when you said "means of priming the target."

And yeah, there seems to be only a few creatures that are excluded from being affected by bleeding, so Factions is pretty good for that degenerative pressure.

As for an Axe build with secondary profession Ranger, I know Apply Poison works very well with the multiple hit attacks from the Axe skills such as Triple Chop and Cyclone Axe. But I'm worried that I won't have enough points in Wilderness Survival after adding a lot to Axe Mastery, Tactics, and possibly Strength for the poison to last a long time and to do a decent amount of pressure. Have you or anyone on these boards used Apply Poison on an Axe to good effect and if so what was your attribute setup?

Stormlord Alex · May 21, 2007, 10:48 PM // 22:48

Ah... The two attacks do not require 11 adrenaline total.
Whenever you strike a foe, or gain adrenaline through a skill, then the adrenaline level on ALL adrenal skills fills up. So, to pull of Sever/Gash, you'd only need 7 adrenaline, not 11.

And to answer your question - for PvE, I find it best to apply Sever/Gash on my target as soon as the skills fill up, to allow them the maximum time to do their damage.
hHwever, Dragon Slash you need to be a bit more careful with - if you use it on a nearly dead target whom dies in mid-swing, the attack fizzles and you don't get adrenaline back from it. And 10 adrenaline *is* a lot to build up.

Also, it doesn't matter quite so much how high the target's CURRENT health is when you hit them with deep wound (not for PvE, anyways), as the deep wound is taken from current health too - it's essentially a huge whack of damage. Example:

Target A has 500 health, and a maximum of 500. He gets hit with deep wound, dropping his maximum health to 400, and his current health his struck to 400 too.

Target B currently has 300 health, with a maximum of 500. He gets hit with deep wound, reducing his maximum health to 400, and his current health to 200.

See? Also, it's important to know that deep wound can never kill a target by itself - it can reduce them to 1hp, so the next hit/degen/whatever will kill them.
Right, that's deep wound explained...

Now... TBH, I never really liked Apply Poison + Axe attacks - while it IS nice to poison everything, it drains your energy like a bitch, spreads attributes thin, and ties up precious skill slots. Without high Wilderness Survival, the poison degen won't do *that* much damage overall. I would have rather spent that 15 energy on 3 Cyclone Axes.

Angel Killuminati · May 22, 2007, 10:32 AM // 10:32

Thanks Stormlord Alex for your excellent feedback. I'm pretty damn noob with Warrior skills and builds to be honest, as I've never really got into melee characters like I said in previous posts above. I'll stay off the Apply Poison road now as well because at the moment I do possess the high energy armor set to get me through the game easier...but when I buy my next set of armor I'm thinking of going for the 'Knights' armor set for extra physical absorption.

It's a shame I can't/won't be able to make a farming build with my warrior as I lack the skills needed from prophecies to make the farming build successful. For a good while now I've though of introducing books like the 'tomes' that have been added to the game, but my versions were tomes that enabled you to unlock skills from other versions of GuildWars. Obviously the market price of these would be huge I imagine also. I got really excited when I heard of tomes, but my dreams hadn't been fulfilled. But this would never happen is it discourages gamers to buy the complete GuildWars set of games, so making the makers and developers less money. AWWWWW!

A Leprechaun · May 22, 2007, 11:58 AM // 11:58

I perfer strength, but then I have all 3 campaigns, but I find the strength skills much more useful as I dont find the need for the defensive powers of a lot of the tactics line and perfer to use the strength damage skills, also if you dont use tactics you have to pick between 2 IASs (flurry or frenzy) niether of which i would use over flail or tiger stance.

~A Leprechaun~

kolakoski · May 22, 2007, 01:58 PM // 13:58

Well met!

Factions only...hmmmm. I would, as soon as possible, get sentinal armor (I prefer the classy subtlety of shing jea, lol), duelist helm, runes to give me 16 sword, 13 strength, and go with the following:

Battle Rage [E], tiger stance, sun & moon, [1. standing slash, power attack] or [2. sever, gash], final thrust, healing signet, [conjure, sig of whatever, rez sig or monk rez,...].

milkflopance · May 22, 2007, 02:06 PM // 14:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by kolakoski

Well met!

Factions only...hmmmm. I would, as soon as possible, get sentinal armor (I prefer the classy subtlety of shing jea, lol), duelist helm, runes to give me 16 sword, 13 strength, and go with the following:

It's best to stay clear of factions sentinal, it's bugged atm and you dont get any bonus from it.

ZenRgy · May 22, 2007, 02:22 PM // 14:22

[skill]"Watch Yourself!"[/skill]

Is quite possibly the best PvE tactics skill.

The best strength skills don't require all that much to get their effect from them eg. [skill]Bull's Strike[/skill] [skill]Flail[/skill] [skill]Enraging Charge[/skill] [skill]Rush[/skill] [skill]Sprint[/skill] [skill]Tiger Stance[/skill] etc.

The only worthwhile Strength elite is [skill]Bull's charge[/skill] in my opinion.

Dragonslash is your best bet as an elite, and as said, the damage bonus from strength isn't good at all, there's no real reason to be dipping a lot of attribute points into it.

SotiCoto · May 22, 2007, 02:25 PM // 14:25

Not that I ever gave it a great deal of thought before...

.... but what happens if you Cyclone Axe with Splinter Weapon on?

Angel Killuminati · May 22, 2007, 02:56 PM // 14:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by ZenRgy

[skill]"Watch Yourself!"[/skill]
the damage bonus from strength isn't good at all, there's no real reason to be dipping a lot of attribute points into it.

That was my biggest fear tbh haven't not tested the damage from high strength too much. I guess going back to my original post to start the thread, I was kind of asking 'does high strength mean harder and more powerful attacks?' Because I instantly though you needed higher strength to deal powerful attacks, but from peoples responses it seems this idea should be thrown in the bin.

It seems from reading other threads and doing some slight testing myself in Balthazar testing arena etc, that 9 Strength does nearly the same as 12-13 Strength. If anything, you lose only 3-5 damage from your attacks which really isn't a lot at all. After the nerf from 2% increase per attribute in Strength to now 1% armor penetration, I guess higher strength doesn't always mean you will deal a lot more damage?

Can anyone elaborate for me the damage that you deal through higher strength or lower strength? As I first thought higher strength would make you deal more damage but it seems that's not the case.

To answer the question above, Cyclone Axe and Splinter weapon deals a fair amount of nice AoE damage.

kolakoski · May 22, 2007, 03:15 PM // 15:15

Well met!

Quote:

Originally Posted by milkflopance

It's best to stay clear of factions sentinal, it's bugged atm and you dont get any bonus from it.

I just checked; there is no mention of the bug in Guru. I recently got Shing Jea sentinal, and I have noticed that I am taking much less damage than with my gladiator armor, especially elemental, which was killing me (literally and figuratively, lol) before.

Stormlord Alex · May 22, 2007, 04:12 PM // 16:12

Quote:

Originally Posted by Angel Killuminati

Can anyone elaborate for me the damage that you deal through higher strength or lower strength? As I first thought higher strength would make you deal more damage but it seems that's not the case.

Just running up some quick tests...

With a Furious 15^50 zodiac sword, and 16 Sword mastery, at 0 Strength, I hit the dummies on the Nameless isles with Wild Blow (assured critical attack skill, very useful).
Results:49 damage vs AL 60, 35 vs AL 80 and 25 vs AL 100.

boosting Strength up to 10 yields...
55 vs AL 60, 40 vs AL 80 and 29 vs AL 100.

So, 10 Strength grants you - provided you ACTUALLY Critical on an attack skill (Strength procs on SKILLS only as opposed to every attack)
- 6 / 5 / 4 extra damage.

Worth it for the damage? I think not.
And there, with simple numbers, we've proved that Strength sucks.

PS... I used a sword for this 'cuz you seem to be interested in Dragon Slashin'
Best of luck to ye'

PPS... Strength zealots, calm down! I'm only saying the effect of Strength sucks. Strength skills are an entirely different matter...

Angel Killuminati · May 22, 2007, 05:08 PM // 17:08

K thanks Stormlord Alex, glad you cleared that up for me as I thought higher strength would instantly guarantee that you would hit a lot harder that 5-6 points more. Bit crap really isn't it when it's called 'strength.'

And yeah I just zoomed through factions this afternoon from 'To Tahnakai Temple quest' To just past the 'Convocation' quest so I can grab Dragon Slash. I know each mission on Factions like the back of my hand...

.....anyway, the way of the dragon here I come!

cellardweller · May 23, 2007, 01:42 AM // 01:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by Angel Killuminati

Can anyone elaborate for me the damage that you deal through higher strength or lower strength? As I first thought higher strength would make you deal more damage but it seems that's not the case.

The biggest reason why strength's inherent effects is that the armour penetration does not effect the +damage from attack skills because they are already armour ignoring.

Taedronai · May 23, 2007, 04:12 AM // 04:12

Quote:

Originally Posted by SotiCoto

Not that I ever gave it a great deal of thought before...

.... but what happens if you Cyclone Axe with Splinter Weapon on?

You can trigger all 5 Splinter Weapon "hits" at once if you hit 5 separate things with Cyclone Axe while under Splinter Weapon....

There's a Rt/W UW Farming build based on that with Cruel Was/Ancestor's Rage. Very, very fast killing.

SotiCoto · May 23, 2007, 07:45 AM // 07:45

Yay! I just tested the Splinter Weapon + Cyclone Axe / Triple Chop thing myself.... It has VERY pretty effects, but ultimately seems to need a Zealous Axe... (and guess what I haven't unlocked yet ¬_¬)