Curse

Byron · May 26, 2006, 07:35 AM // 07:35

It seems here the entire time that Ahura was only trying to say that his combined spike outdamages a dual Eviscerate->Executioner's. This is a point which isn't a matter of opinion: of course hammer will outdamage axe - it deals more damage.

My argument has been that such a spike is good only on paper, and accomodating for it in a multi warrior team isn't going to go well:

Non-elite KDs are going to go sour, because they'll take two moves to accomplish and/or cause the warrior to lose all adrenaline. Anet was very smart to not allow hammer warriors to chain 4 big damage hits together: Taking forceful means that you rely on bull's strike or shock for your KD (unreliable and costly, accordingly), or you have a KD that causes you to lose all adrenaline (thus disabling the chaining of your hardest hitting attacks).

Maybe that it is that I am of the old school, but it seems that if I can't chain my KD, then I might as well not have it. Bringing two skills on my bar soley for the use of conditional spiking (the conditions being: both warriors present and fully able) seems like gimping the most reliable weapon in a team's arsenal. And just having crushing blow on the bar doesn't make everything okay, IMHO.

There might have been a strike of balance between the forceful->fierce chain and the more standard KD->crushing chain, if not for the power of KD and deep wound outside spiking situations. KD is the most effective snare, holding the target in a place for you to dominate, whether its during a spike, pressuring a target, preventing an enemy escape, or helping your teammates kite. In that respect, it only makes sense to bring your hardest hitting attacks after a knockdown. Using the forceful->fierce chain prevents this, though the combo does unload a heap of damage.

And I think the deep wound argument has already been closed.

The balance of weapons is still strong because hammer brings power at a cost of speed and defense, and it has always been that way.

I think Ahura is beginning to see the more appllicable practices of the established warrior "School," being:

-A warrior spike kills with or without redundant deep wounds. Teams have been doing it for a while.

-Deep wound is more powerful than damage in most situations.

-Combined spiking isn't the end-all of warrior ability. A single warrior is more than capable of downing a target on his own, thanks largely to KD and deep wound.

And I'm glad to continue this discussion, which has furthered my understanding of metagame and in-game strategy.

**EDIT = typos

ghostof · May 26, 2006, 06:57 PM // 18:57

Alrighty. lets stir the Pot a bit. For learning.

It seems that the agreed upon higher pure dps weapon is the sword. Now then I was watching a gvg match and seeing some of the new sword specials utilized.

Will the sword replace the hammer or the axe in a standard 2 warrior gvg build? I just wanted to point out that I was most impressed by the seemingly powerful repeat strike ability with the new sword specials to continueously inflict a lot of damage.

Zui · May 26, 2006, 08:01 PM // 20:01

To quote Ensign from another thread:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

The baseline for pressure in this discussion is a warrior who does nothing other than autoattack a caster. With an unmodded max weapon and 16 attribute, he'll dish out the following amounts of damage:

Sword: 34.12 damage per hit, 25.59 damage per second, 1536 damage per minute; 38.39 damage per second, 2303 damage per minute while under Frenzy
Axe: 35.55 damage per hit, 26.66 damage per second, 1600 damage per minute; 40 damage per second, 2400 damage per minute while under Frenzy
Hammer: 51.36 damage per hit, 29.35 damage per second, 1761 damage per minute; 44.02 damage per second, 2641 damage per minute while under Frenzy

Now what was this about the higher dps weapon being a sword? Admittedly skills change everything, but the skills someone may bring vary, and there's always conditional skills like Final Thrust, which can't really be accounted for optimal dps effectively, since they're so conditional.

Symbol · May 26, 2006, 08:24 PM // 20:24

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ghostof

Will the sword replace the hammer or the axe in a standard 2 warrior gvg build? I just wanted to point out that I was most impressed by the seemingly powerful repeat strike ability with the new sword specials to continueously inflict a lot of damage.

I've been running a sword warrior build optimized for pure dps in PvP for a little while now (standing + dragon + sun and moon + for great justice being the core).

I can say that it works pretty well in 4v4s and the less organized gametypes (Fort Aspenwood, Alliance Battles), because the ability to quickly gank NPCs and take down unaware players is (IMO) more valuable than the ability to spike with DW (which is of limited value in team arenas especially).

I don't know how well it would perform in GvG. My thought is that in a standard two warrior build a hammer war or a charge war running sever/gash/final would probably be better. In a three warrior build there may be room for such a pressure oriented sworder.

It's really a very high amount of dps though. I'm talking some 30-40% above an evisc/executioner's axe war, it's just hard for me to evaluate how much that is worth.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zui

Now what was this about the higher dps weapon being a sword? Admittedly skills change everything, but the skills someone may bring vary, and there's always conditional skills like Final Thrust, which can't really be accounted for optimal dps effectively, since they're so conditional.

Sorry, you can't honestly compare dps without looking at skills. Factions added a couple of dps oriented sword elites that change the picture dramatically.

Zui · May 26, 2006, 08:53 PM // 20:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by Symbol

Sorry, you can't honestly compare dps without looking at skills. Factions added a couple of dps oriented sword elites that change the picture dramatically.

I said as much: "Admittedly skills change everything". I also said that it's very hard to look at dps with skills, since there are a wide array of skills that one might bring, and some are conditional like Final Thrust. It's only possible to account for DPS with skills if you have an exact bar, and then if there are conditional skills, only for a range in dps.

ghostof · May 31, 2006, 08:47 AM // 08:47

Severe Artery
Gash
Sun and Moon
Final Thrust
Sprint
Heal Sig
Shadow Shroud {E}
Rez

12+1+3=16 Swordsmanship
8+1=9 Tactics
5+1=6 Strength
9 Shadow Arts

I am in need of a snare and found hamstring to be to much energy with Shadow Shroud. I am thinking Bull's Strike instead of Sun and Moon. Running Zealous Sword. When teamed with a hammer this has been most effective for spikes in basic Team Arena testing I have been able to do so far. I haven't had the chance to try it in GvG. Also thought about Galrath Slash if I could count on the hammer to kd and have the emo's snaring targets.

Byron · May 31, 2006, 10:22 PM // 22:22

Shadow shroud might work in TA because almost every team brings a boon prot. Of course, mend condition, gift of health, and signet of devotion still work. It's much more effective to shut down the monk with a mesmer, or overstress him with damage pressure, than trying to do everything yourself.

zoozoc · Jun 01, 2006, 06:03 AM // 06:03

People actually do use shadow shroud on sword warriors. I've seen top GvG guilds do it. Sure I personally don't like it, but it isn't that bad and shadow shroud can be extremely helpful in certain situations.

ghostof · Jun 02, 2006, 06:09 PM // 18:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by Byron

Shadow shroud might work in TA because almost every team brings a boon prot. Of course, mend condition, gift of health, and signet of devotion still work. It's much more effective to shut down the monk with a mesmer, or overstress him with damage pressure, than trying to do everything yourself.

It just opens your mesmer to select a better elite skill while being able to cover the hex. I found that its really more of an energy pressure forcing the monk to almost always use CoP early causing MoR to be lost. It really helps in applying pressure. In GvG this is really to setup a spike on the soft target not necessarily the monk. The goal being to prevent enchantment based healing while the mesmer(s) attempt to shutdown the opposing monk for an adrenline spike.

I am looking at replacing Sprint with Siphon Speed. It acts as the cover hex and lets me close on the target with a quick timer to recast. Will move points from strength to deadly arts. This also serves as the snare. Going to try this out later on this weekend.

fb2000 · Jun 02, 2006, 10:56 PM // 22:56

hm, i am just starting to wonder, is axe a better spiker than hammer?
the skillchain ive been using a bit :
backbreaker, crushing, mighty, irresistable

i do get a deep wound from it, and the dmg is simply outrageous. only warriors seem to be able to survive this chain (provided no outside influence). why does everyone state axe spikes better?

JR · Jun 03, 2006, 01:35 AM // 01:35

Quote:

Originally Posted by fb2000

hm, i am just starting to wonder, is axe a better spiker than hammer?
the skillchain ive been using a bit :
backbreaker, crushing, mighty, irresistable

i do get a deep wound from it, and the dmg is simply outrageous. only warriors seem to be able to survive this chain (provided no outside influence). why does everyone state axe spikes better?

That *is* stronger on a single monk, but you only find single monk teams in Arena. Against a two monk team your spike is slower, which means it would be easier to stop.

Byron · Jun 03, 2006, 06:06 AM // 06:06

Cover hexes from a warrior? It's like you're speaking Greek.

shardfenix · Jun 03, 2006, 12:06 PM // 12:06

FACT: The averager hammer warrior can kill a monk in Random Arenas or Team Arenas in only 3 hits.

*bling* (does "The More You Know" theme)

JR · Jun 03, 2006, 01:49 PM // 13:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by shardfenix

FACT: The averager hammer warrior can kill a monk in Random Arenas or Team Arenas in only 3 hits.

*bling* (does "The More You Know" theme)

Monks in RA have a habit of running multiple sups and not using Prot Spirit?

Helll is for Heroes · Jun 03, 2006, 01:52 PM // 13:52

hammers are very good. their critical hits and damage is higher than sword or axe, however, their damage swing is not as good as a sword/axe since it hits every 1.5 secs.

Axe for damage, hammer for disruption.

Greedy Gus · Jun 03, 2006, 02:01 PM // 14:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by Helll is for Heroes

hits every 1.5 secs.

wrong.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Helll is for Heroes

Axe for damage

wrong.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Helll is for Heroes

hammer for disruption.

wrong.

Look, it's standard for axe wars to bring shock, bull's strike, distracting blow, disrupting chop, etc. They certainly bring quite a bit of disruption to the table. Yes, hammers swing more slowly than axes (1.75 sec), but the harder hits more than make up for it, so you do more damage (DPS). Contemporary axe and hammer wars both bring sufficient amounts of damage and disruption.

Generally speaking: you go axe for eviscerate, and you go hammer for irresistable blow. Other things that can sway your choice would be backbreaker, KD chaining, or secondary freedom while retaining on-demand KDs (w/a hammer for example).

Zui · Jun 03, 2006, 09:57 PM // 21:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by JR-

Monks in RA have a habit of running multiple sups and not using Prot Spirit?

Yes. I ran into a hybred healing/protection/smiting/divine favor monk last night on my team while I was goofing off. After we won the first 3 matches, he stated it was because he was using all superiors.

Also ran into an E/W using flurry, frenzy, then healsig, in that order... RA is a special place.

Fenix Swiftblade · Jun 05, 2006, 05:02 PM // 17:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by JR-

Quote:

Originally Posted by fb2000

hm, i am just starting to wonder, is axe a better spiker than hammer?
the skillchain ive been using a bit :
backbreaker, crushing, mighty, irresistable

i do get a deep wound from it, and the dmg is simply outrageous. only warriors seem to be able to survive this chain (provided no outside influence). why does everyone state axe spikes better?

That *is* stronger on a single monk, but you only find single monk teams in Arena. Against a two monk team your spike is slower, which means it would be easier to stop.

But what are the other 4 offensive characters in your build doing while you have this monk on the ground for 4 seconds? If the second monk has enough other things to deal with (like a good blackout maybe, or a second Backbreaker), either the guy you knocked down will die, or something else will.

fb2000 · Jun 05, 2006, 06:43 PM // 18:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fenix

But what are the other 4 offensive characters in your build doing while you have this monk on the ground for 4 seconds? If the second monk has enough other things to deal with (like a good blackout maybe, or a second Backbreaker), either the guy you knocked down will die, or something else will.

i like to use that combo on one of the monks (provided they are 2). this way the other uses up a fair amount of energy and possibly needs several secs to recharge skills, so its easy pickings (somewhat)

thing is there is always unsufficient skill-slots on the bar for a hammer ^^

PS someone also mentioned the evisc penetrating exe spike would be superior to evisc rake exe, but i simply have to disagree, nothing beats having a crippled on target too (or maybe it was another thread..)

Dzan · Jun 06, 2006, 12:59 AM // 00:59

Axe Rake is ok in a pressure build, bad if you are adrenal spiking. If I have Monk A Blacked Out, and two warriors adrenal spike Monk B I expect him to die.

If he lives through the Backbreaker, Crushing, Mighty, Ires, Eviscerate, Executioners and maybe a Lightning Orb or two something is wrong. The monk shouldn't be alive to be crippled.

In a build like Dual Smite then I suppose its OK though I don't think its a reliable snare so probably your build has other and better snares.