Curse

Burakus Lightwing · May 16, 2006, 10:08 PM // 22:08

I have a question for all of you Assassins out there.
I made a R/A and am only at level 15- not too much time invested.
My question for all of you is simple. Am I truly sacrificing that much extra damage for energy. The main reason I went with Ranger primary was to use expertise as an energy saver and benefit from the +elemental armor.
I have been playing for awhile and I always like to have my main attribute (especially weapon) at a minimum of 14, ideally 16.
By going R/A I can only get daggers to 12 (I knew this) and I am missing out on the critical strikes line.

Will this make potential builds that much more inferior?
My plan is to have

12 dagger mastery
10 expertise (8+1+1)
8 Wilderness (7+1)
8 shadow Arts

-This is long - sorry -

I typically only focus on 2 attributes lines with a few points sprinkled into a third. Now I feel that in order to be effective, I need to distribute points to all 4 areas.
Am I spreading myself too thin?
I'm looking at balance. I know skills I would like to use both for PvP and PvE, what it really comes down to is this. Would I be that much more effective by making my "assassin" an Assassin primary by using the critical strikes line and extra weapon attributes or can a R/A be just as effective without energy issues?

Sendai · May 16, 2006, 10:13 PM // 22:13

i have an R/A with 13 expertise and zealous daggers and I'm very fine with it. I know i'm missing out the critical strikes attributes but most skils in that line costs 10 energy and i would'nt be able to spam them as much as i do with the dagger mastery line and the shadow arts stances.

Burakus Lightwing · May 17, 2006, 03:29 PM // 15:29

That was my thinking. I'm hoping that with a lower energy cost I can increase the spam-ablity of skills. I think that this would offset my 12 in daggers as opposed to going into that 14-16 range, not to mention there aren't many skills in crit strikes that I feel I really need/like.

Rukmedes · May 17, 2006, 04:58 PM // 16:58

The damage difference from 12 to 16 is quite large, and you do lose alot of % to do criticals.

Dagger mastery also adds more % to do 2 hits at once, and dagger mastery also adds a small % to criticals also.

Imo, going R/A is inferior, you lose damage, alot of it, for just a bit of mana.

Take A/* and just go slower.

http://gw.gamewikis.org/wiki/Critical_hit 12 DM is about 17.4%, while 16 is 22.9%.

Burakus Lightwing · May 17, 2006, 05:31 PM // 17:31

Thanks, for the link!!
I wasn't aware that Crit. strikes gave you energy back as well. I think you may be right. I seem to be sacrificing a good deal of potential damage for a little energy mgmt.

lightblade · May 17, 2006, 07:47 PM // 19:47

R/A do less than 75% damage as A/x

On the other hand, R/A is more durable in battle. But not by a significant amount. A/x is still the way to go.

And what else is exciting? Waiting for this season's champions to make build templates for us!

GranDeWun · May 17, 2006, 08:22 PM // 20:22

Drop Shadow Arts, focus on the other 3 attributes, use Whirling Def and Lightning Reflexes from the expertise group.

Basically, you will be -atk, +def. Probably better for PvE.

Wolydarg · May 17, 2006, 10:25 PM // 22:25

I just use troll/app poison to make use of the wilderness rune/line. Breakpoint of expertise at 13 for 2 energy dagger skills...

I made my ranger over the sin based purely on cosmetics =P

whobitz · Aug 13, 2006, 06:26 PM // 18:26

Not sure how well it works, and as it says it's best in Alliance Battles, but this build might be ok:
http://www.gw.gamewikis.org/wiki/R/A...rtise_Assassin
I'm gonna bet using a chain that ends with Mobius Strike could easily deal good, sustained damage. I find that, in general, A/x has better spike capability, and R/A is better at pressuring with constant damage in PvP or PvE.