cRPG
cRPG => General Discussion => Topic started by: Gorath on February 25, 2011, 07:29:40 pm
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So after playing many many builds (I currently have 3 "mains"@ level 30 and 13 "alts" 20+) throughout c-RPG I figured I'd get everyone's views on optimized skill point maximums.
Skill name: Max points (followed by reasoning)
Shield: 4
Having played shielders for quite a while (pre-patch I was very heavy into sword and board combat for style) the effect of the shield skill seems to boil down to extra shield HP only. Sure, supposedly it seems to have an effect on the "speed" of your shield, but I have never noticed any. Currently my shielder has 8 shield skill, pre-patch I had 9. In both cases I never noticed any real increase in speed from the guys who stopped at 4 to use a Huscarl. Sure my shield rarely broke but with a huscarl or heavy board shield that doesn't happen much anyways. Hell, in most battles if you put it away vs axemen and only use it for people without axes even heater shields last quite a while. Guys like Cyranule only have 4 shield skill (and 12 agi) and are no more slow than my 8 points (almost double). Conclusion: Just get the 4 points if you're going to be a shield and then stop wasting your skill points.
Athletics: 3-4
Currently I have 7 and 8 athletics on my mains (depending on which one) and wear light-medium armor. I have noticed consistantly in battle AND duel servers that strength builders such as Goretooth, Cyranule, Wallace, etc are able to keep movement speed pace with my characters even though they have far less agility, less than half my athletics skill and wear twice as much weight as I do. Sure you notice a difference if you're naked, but if you plan to wear armor at all it seems that the tangible benefit of the skill stops after 3 or 4. I have made it a point to ask people in the duel server their athletics value and get their thoughts and the general consensus has been that other than getting from point a to point b faster if uninterrupted (yeah right, with all the ranged spam?) that athletics for the most part is worthless. Save yourself some skill-points and stop at 3-4.
Pure build WM: 3
This is pretty subjective however I find that if my main melee wpf is at 130 I never feel like it's too low vs anyone of any build (str or agi) in order to be able to block and counterattack properly. With this in mind you can achieve 132 wpp in a single weapon by level 30 with only 3 WM points. If you're a pure build, this would be the number I would shoot for and stop. After this point you are basically spending a skill point for 10 (or less) WPF points each time, which the effective benefit from doesn't seem that great to me.
The other skills all seem to retain a use for higher point values, but these three are the ones that after playing c-RPG all this time have really shown themselves to not be worth higher skill point investments than what I've laid out above. Coincidentally this has also been consistant with the greater value of a str-build vs an agi-build currently.
Share your thoughts and findings. 8-)
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This is my current build
Strength: 18
Agility: 21
Converted: 8
Power Strike: 6
Shield: 4
Athletics: 6
Weapon Master: 7
One Handed: 3
Two Handed: 140
Polearm: 110
But if some of these things are unncecessary, like athletics......
I might have to re-think my point conversions and try to squeeze out another 6 from the build somewhere.
Just have to decide if I would put it in agi or bring str up to 21 as well...
or perhaps keep those points and put them into IF. It seems IF at least has a direct value the more armor you equip.
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I have 9 athl and im faster than anyone else. I can outbackpedal most shielders. Im sure I wouldnt be able to do that with 4 athl. It seems that with your maximums youll have a lot of points to convert.
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but is it your high agi that does that for you?? or your actual athletics. you are a ninja, so I am assuming your agi is high 27 range...
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I have 9 athl and im faster than anyone else. I can outbackpedal most shielders. Im sure I wouldnt be able to do that with 4 athl. It seems that with your maximums youll have a lot of points to convert.
Well two things:
1) I assume you're a ninja, and thus wearing pretty much no armor. If so I made mention of this that if you're not wearing any armor that athletics does seem to increase your speed noticably, but that if you wear any armor at all (mail or higher, medium-heavy tiers) that the effect seems to drop off drastically.
2) You can outbackpedal most shielders. Shielders are slower than snail crap anyways, one of the curses of using a shield, I can outbackpedal most shielders on most of my alts who are around level 20 with only 3-4 athletics tops. Of course my alts are semi-nude because they're still saving up money, but still. :wink:
Thanks for the input thought. I'm curious why with only 1 point more athletics you get a completely different opinion of your speed in relation to others than I do with 8 athletics. Perhaps there's some kind of value-effect correlation here where instead of linear progression we have something akin to 1-3 athletics doesn't seem like much, but 3-4 is more noticable. 4-6 doesn't seem like much change, but 6-7 is, etc. Just a thought. Or it could be because you're not wearing armor as I said. I plan to do a more in-depth test of the mechanic and value on an alt I have levelling where I record the differences at each point with runs done naked, in lamellar, in mail and if possible in 45+ armor as well.
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I think a good aspect of the game is that you cant bring down everything to numbers and effective maximums. Sure, its good to know what is reasonable to spent skills in, but only to a certain degree. After that its a pure matter of taste and a matter if you feel well with your build. You have to play good with it after all.
add to your list:
Power Strike: 5-7
I have never played below 15 strength and will probably never do. 5 PS gives you enough power to kill anything, if you know the reach of your weapon. With PS 7 and decent damage of weapon you 1 hit most players except plate. Going higher is not wasted at all, you will gain more chance of crusthrough if you use this kind of (2h) weapon and will hurt plated guys much more. So the maximum effectivness is -even more than with other skills - a matter of taste. Nonetheless i picked 5-7 as most effecitve for the reasons mentioned.
Iron Flesh: 0/8+
Unless you plan on going on high strength and wearing heavy armour at least occasionally IF is a waste of skill points. And if you do put in all you have. The difference with 8 IF and heavy armour is quite huge and can grant surviving many more rounds than without. In between 0 and 7-8 there is no point in planning on investing into it. Of course its ok to spent your last 3 spare skill points if you dont know what to do with them.
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You are right about athletics. On my 7 athletics char there was a huge difference between mail setup and shirt+only one weapon setup. But in mail I was only a wee bit faster than 6 athletics char with 15kg more weight.
I disagree about ironflesh though. It's not something you immediately notice, but every time you survive with 2-10 hp left it was the 5 ironflesh that saved you. All kills you make after that, or rounds you win, were paid by it. But I guess you really need 50+ armor to really get use out of it.
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Also, what i can say, is that athletics 10+ with agi 30+ is great build for... crossbowman. Light crossbow and you are doing it very good, even vs archers due to possiblity to move yourself after "ass" animation stage. With 10 athletics, you can simply dodge most of arrows or hide yourself under nearest cover faster than your enemy.
My build:
Level 30 (4 420 577 xp)
Strength: 9
Agility: 30
Hit points: 44
Converted: 8
Ironflesh: 0
Power Strike: 3
Shield: 0
Athletics: 10
Riding: 0
Horse Archery: 0
Power Draw: 0
Power Throw: 0
Weapon Master: 10
One Handed: 1
Two Handed: 1
Polearm: 1
Archery: 1
Crossbow: 190
Throwing: 1
Try it, ninjas, and you will see that it is more viable than "agile [light] archer with nomad bow" about what i did start a discussion. Due to 45 pierce dmg (even more, if heirloomed!) and about 1,5-2 secs of reloading at the very end of grind (30 lvl) and such running speed you can even backpedal someone, reload, shoot, and backpedal again ...
So no, 4 athletics isnt maximum, it is the LEAST. :)
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Sorry Dravic, I'll change the title to specify melee discussion. Ranged doesn't apply as it really doesn't require much thought :P
(yeah I have xbowmen and archers/throwers too. They're not even close to the same animal as melee) :wink:
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My 7 ath character can easily control the pace of a duel with any lower ath character. (I wear a gambeson usually) With a longsword I can just move in and out of my opponents range, often, I can stab someones head as they're recovering from an attack. In battle, I can pick and choose where I fight. If outnumbered I can book it, loop around a building and take some other group from the rear. If fighting heavies, I can stand and fight or throw in a few hits and leave, to return again later.
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I think you're missing the point of athletics. The way I see it, faster sprinting is a minor bonus on top of the main advantage - maneuverability. Athletics significantly reduces the time it takes to switch movement directions. This makes a critical difference against all but the faciest of huggers (and even then, should they have sub-par camera control).
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I think you're missing the point of athletics. The way I see it, faster sprinting is a minor bonus on top of the main advantage - maneuverability. Athletics significantly reduces the time it takes to switch movement directions. This makes a critical difference against all but the faciest of huggers (and even then, should they have sub-par camera control).
See this is actually why I've always tried to pump athletics. Faster sprinting is a meh thing in my mind. But it's precisely this effect that I notice no benefit from with my 7 or 8 athletics over players such as Goretooth in his umpteen billion heirloomed black armor (easily 2-3x the weight I'm wearing) with a str build, or Cyranule for instance with his 12 agi (so 4 athletics possible) and heraldic mail + huscarl weight. They can keep up with my maneuverability and be just as fast with the footwork of diving in and out, strafing, etc as I am with less than half the weight and double the athletics.
Someone mentioned that perhaps I'm encumbered, but really? I need the formula for that cause it's hard to believe with 18 str that wearing tribal warrior, leather boots, wisby gloves, klappvisor and a swiss halbard (or fister) is too much weight. It's only:
weapon 2.8-3
Armor 5
Head 3
Gloves .75
boots .75
Total 12.5 at the most.
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I think a good aspect of the game is that you cant bring down everything to numbers and effective maximums.
I disagree. This is a game/computer program. Ultimately, it all comes down to numbers, like everything else in the game. And I'm certain there is a formula that can be applied here. Said formula simply isn't publicly available at this point.
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Higher shield skill is definitely worth it. Its just sometimes there are other things more worth it :P The extra speed and HP is very nice.
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Someone mentioned that perhaps I'm encumbered, but really? I need the formula for that cause it's hard to believe with 18 str that wearing tribal warrior, leather boots, wisby gloves, klappvisor and a swiss halbard (or fister) is too much weight. It's only:
weapon 2.8-3
Armor 5
Head 3
Gloves .75
boots .75
Total 12.5 at the most.
I have 20 total weight on my agi build and Im fast with 148 wpf, so thats not your problem. More agi and more ath will make you more maneuvrable.
I think the formula is : WPF - total weight = real WPF
So -12.5 is nothing really.
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I disagree. This is a game/computer program. Ultimately, it all comes down to numbers, like everything else in the game. And I'm certain there is a formula that can be applied here. Said formula simply isn't publicly available at this point.
Speed bonus from swings/thrusts is a client variable from the whiff(-x%)to a crazy uber well placed horse lance(got a 750% speed bonus in singeplayer once xD)
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I have 20 total weight on my agi build and Im fast with 148 wpf, so thats not your problem. More agi and more ath will make you more maneuvrable.
I think the formula is : WPF - total weight = real WPF
So -12.5 is nothing really.
Weapon weight shouldn't affect WPF
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My next question is.... so does high strength affect encumberance?
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Anyone else finding Gorath's posts extremely biased (towards himself) and also extremely noobish ?
I don't agree on any maximum, it depends on the character and playstyle, there's no fixed maximum each character build and each player are different.
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Anyone else finding Gorath's posts extremely biased (towards himself) and also extremely noobish ?
I don't agree on any maximum, it depends on the character and playstyle, there's no fixed maximum each character build and each player are different.
+1
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I think Gorath's post was really interesting! :) Thanks Gorath!
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Anyone else finding Gorath's posts extremely biased (towards himself) and also extremely noobish ?
I don't agree on any maximum, it depends on the character and playstyle, there's no fixed maximum each character build and each player are different.
They're opinions presented with reasoning as to why I've come to the conclusions that I have. Opinions are always biased from ones own perspective. :rolleyes: This was for discussion of other peoples thoughts, experiences and conclusions as it pertains to the value of some skills and at what point they feel the value ceases to be worth the point cost.
Just because you have no worthwhile input doesn't mean other people haven't been sharing their own thoughts as to the effective value cap of certain skills. However, thanks for bumping the thread. As for the topic at hand, do you find a noticable benefit to 8 athletics while wearing medium-heavy armor vs someone with 4 athletics wearing medium-heavy armor? If so does it seem like double the speed and maneuverability? Do you feel that your shielder with 7-8 shield skill is faster than the str-shielders who only have 4 shield in order to huscarl it up? What's the speed difference you notice between someone with 130 wpf and someone with 150 (effectively 2-3 more wm for that 20 point increase)?
Or do you just fail to comprehend the point of the discussion and thread still?
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Anyone else finding Gorath's posts extremely biased (towards himself) and also extremely noobish ?
I don't agree on any maximum, it depends on the character and playstyle, there's no fixed maximum each character build and each player are different.
Considering he brought up reasons for every one of his opinions, I will say no.
Regardless of Athletics on light armored targets, it is practically worthless for tin cans to take any amount of Athletics beyond an initial few (And he did say this).
I think while I disagree with a few of his points here, there are a considerable amount of good points. He is not presenting this as Gospel (Do this or you scrubnub), he is merely saying "Anyone else agree with this too? this is what I found."
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I agree on most what Gorath said. I've had 8 shieldskill and 8 athletics and it's nice to be quick on your feet in 1 on 1 duels. It helps there.
But I did find it disturbing I could hit someone 3 times, mess up once and drop dead in a single hit. Now I have a 21/15 build and it works nice, but it still takes too many hits on some players to take them out and I hardly notice the difference in duels. The only thing I have to watch out for are the backward jumpswings as you will get outreached and killed if you try to keep up.
Next gen I will probably try a 24/12 build and see how that goes with full IF/PS and 4 in shield/ath/WM. I doubt it will be a large speeddifference, but the survivability and extra damage should make up for that.
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Just because you have no worthwhile input doesn't mean other people haven't been sharing their own thoughts as to the effective value cap of certain skills. However, thanks for bumping the thread. As for the topic at hand, do you find a noticable benefit to 8 athletics while wearing medium-heavy armor vs someone with 4 athletics wearing medium-heavy armor? If so does it seem like double the speed and maneuverability? Do you feel that your shielder with 7-8 shield skill is faster than the str-shielders who only have 4 shield in order to huscarl it up? What's the speed difference you notice between someone with 130 wpf and someone with 150 (effectively 2-3 more wm for that 20 point increase)?
I agree and this is also why the balance between pures and hybrids needs to be changed. You just don't get enough for being a pure, certainly not enough to justify not taking a ranged weapon.
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w/r/t athletics, single point increases have always felt substantial to me. Of course, it's only immediately after the upgrade that you notice, then you habituate and feels basically the same.
I can say, the jump from 6 to 7 on Rain's current build was huge, with my current loadout of Heater+German+Italian/Hammer+Usual-Armor, so eh. Also, on my latest alt, tremendous upgrade from 7-8. It is a ninja build basically, so perhaps irrelevant. I couldn't believe how much faster it was though.
Also, you're probably doing it wrong. I can dance around Cyranule (with shield at least) / Walllace / whomever else fine. Goretooth is peculiarly speedy though.
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so nobody uses ironflesh...?
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so nobody uses ironflesh...?
Oh people do, certainly, if they are laying a heavy set armor build, or have a few extra points to burn or for the lulz.
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Currently, armor values are so low and people hit so hard with small weapons that everything you are interested into is sheer speed. Strenght build might be succesful, but usually either the player behind is skilled or the char is crushthrough oriented.
-ATH perhaps the better skill IMO. Makes you able to choose fights, to reliably kill groups of enemies (running in and out), to surprise attack and play with weapon reaches
-WM the increase in wpf seems marginal, but the speed given still is a big advantage (feints)
-Shield, probably at the same level as PS, depends on the str/agi ratio and the shield you plan to use (small shield users like me appreciate that skill)
-PS well, good but usually above 4-5 you will two shot most people
-IF I found it the most useless among melee skills. If you have money to spend on armor, why not. But you can be as succesful with a cheap equipment and no IF.
Note: I see shield+1h fighting as, well, fighting. I usually die against shielders with a "turtle" behavior, because my goal is to kill, and their's is not to kill but to survive (or at least they act so). So I use small and fast shields (but not the jedi orange presses, ffs), usually the knightly heather shield. It gives minimal protection to arrows, very few health points, medium armor, but is very fast. This type of shield is succesful when played in an aggresive manner (or at least it's my impression). It's very good for fighting against disadvantaging numbers.
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I completely agree with the points in the OP. 4 Athletics, 4 shield skill and 3-4 weaponmaster are the most one should invest into those skills. Also, ever since the wpf nerf STR builds have been far better than AGI/balanced builds in my opinion. Having to hit someone 1-2 times versus 3-4 times makes a HUGE difference in a fight; you effectively only need to land 50% of the hits that they need to land in order to score a kill, at the sacrifice of having a slightly slower weapon swing speed.
WAIT NEVER MIND WHAT I JUST WROTE.
Pour all your points into AGI. It's good for you! Really! And after you've dumped a bunch of points into AGI/athletics/weaponmaster, please make sure you're on the opposite team as me in the Battle/Siege servers :lol:
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I tried a 9/33 3-6-11 agi wpn master build. 198 wpf.
faster because of the athletics, the wpf is kind of a waste. And yes, easily can get first 3 hits in, then die to one.
Agi builds allready get screwed from game mechanics - such as getting slowed down by a carpet? REALLY? Other stupid terrain modifiers - like wood, my ninja gets all clumsy from walking on boards? huh. People who hate getting out footworked will lobby to keep this so.
Currently my thrower build can do ok with 3 athletics, though 4 would be bettter. wpf for throwing is not showing much at 117. Funny though, getting lots of kills with... 31 polearm.
Weapon speeds are bullshit, relying on the 'numbers' in this game is a sure way to frustration. To top it off, my polearm of choice is gimped by too short a hitbox.
IronFlesh - all or nothing they say .. hmm..I don't buy it, but ultimately (2skills to one attribute) trade 3 hp from IF to 1 hp from extra str, and str for more power is a compelling argument. Even 1 IF is 2 hp, potentially the difference between a black health bar and spectator mode.
Most skills are diminishing returns.
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I've been trying some weapons lately with my main: 21/15 all wpf in 1h.
I picked up a bec in some siege game. Colonel was nice enough to tripple heirloom it for me.
I was surprised by the speed I could swing it with and it wasn't difficult at all to keep up with the polearmers/2hs I fought. They weren't able to outspam me at all and I ended the round at 8:0 having used only that bec with 1 wpf.
So next retirement I'm trying a 24/12 build and I'll see what happens.
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just to add my .2 cents I have noticed a small difference in maneuverability going from 7 ATH to 5 now. such as my backpedal dodge while dueling.
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just to add my .2 cents I have noticed a small difference in maneuverability going from 7 ATH to 5 now. such as my backpedal dodge while dueling.
Yeah, I'm fairly sure that if you want to be able to backpedal and use footwork to dodge effectively, essentially allowing you to skip your "blocking phase" and move directly to your next attack phase, the magic number is 8 athletics and very light equipment. With this setup, you will be able to outmaneuver MOST people in a duel. Short of this, I really don't see much point in going over the previously stated 4 athletics. IMO, athletics 5-7 is only a stepping stone to the truly effective levels of athletics.
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Currently, armor values are so low and people hit so hard with small weapons that everything you are interested into is sheer speed. Strenght build might be succesful, but usually either the player behind is skilled or the char is crushthrough oriented.
Thing is strength build once breaks through to oneshotting (or needing one less hit). That's a huge difference, for one thing you get a free kill on everyone you attack without him reacting. Mostly small weapons that hit hard are heirloomed, but this also makes it easy to oneshot everyone with str build.
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This is an interesting thread, thanks for starting it. I've been dissatisfied with my 15str/21 Agi build and am trying a more Str oriented build next retirement. I'd prefer to play an Agi-based character, there's so little improvement ingame that I'm thinking 21/15 or 24/12 are going to become everyone's next default build.
Why the hell does Athletics not have much effect on heavier armor? I can understand a reduced effect, but it's miniscule now.
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So after playing many many builds (I currently have 3 "mains"@ level 30 and 13 "alts" 20+) throughout c-RPG I figured I'd get everyone's views on optimized skill point maximums.
Skill name: Max points (followed by reasoning)
Shield: 4
Having played shielders for quite a while (pre-patch I was very heavy into sword and board combat for style) the effect of the shield skill seems to boil down to extra shield HP only. Sure, supposedly it seems to have an effect on the "speed" of your shield, but I have never noticed any. Currently my shielder has 8 shield skill, pre-patch I had 9. In both cases I never noticed any real increase in speed from the guys who stopped at 4 to use a Huscarl. Sure my shield rarely broke but with a huscarl or heavy board shield that doesn't happen much anyways. Hell, in most battles if you put it away vs axemen and only use it for people without axes even heater shields last quite a while. Guys like Cyranule only have 4 shield skill (and 12 agi) and are no more slow than my 8 points (almost double). Conclusion: Just get the 4 points if you're going to be a shield and then stop wasting your skill points.
Athletics: 3-4
Currently I have 7 and 8 athletics on my mains (depending on which one) and wear light-medium armor. I have noticed consistantly in battle AND duel servers that strength builders such as Goretooth, Cyranule, Wallace, etc are able to keep movement speed pace with my characters even though they have far less agility, less than half my athletics skill and wear twice as much weight as I do. Sure you notice a difference if you're naked, but if you plan to wear armor at all it seems that the tangible benefit of the skill stops after 3 or 4. I have made it a point to ask people in the duel server their athletics value and get their thoughts and the general consensus has been that other than getting from point a to point b faster if uninterrupted (yeah right, with all the ranged spam?) that athletics for the most part is worthless. Save yourself some skill-points and stop at 3-4.
Pure build WM: 3
This is pretty subjective however I find that if my main melee wpf is at 130 I never feel like it's too low vs anyone of any build (str or agi) in order to be able to block and counterattack properly. With this in mind you can achieve 132 wpp in a single weapon by level 30 with only 3 WM points. If you're a pure build, this would be the number I would shoot for and stop. After this point you are basically spending a skill point for 10 (or less) WPF points each time, which the effective benefit from doesn't seem that great to me.
The other skills all seem to retain a use for higher point values, but these three are the ones that after playing c-RPG all this time have really shown themselves to not be worth higher skill point investments than what I've laid out above. Coincidentally this has also been consistant with the greater value of a str-build vs an agi-build currently.
Share your thoughts and findings. 8-)
having done 10 generations of shielder...
You can go STR shielder in which case all the max skill levels you list are just fine. you will kill players real good... and yes if you put the shield away against axes itll last longer. but... you wont be able to run around solo very effectively. soon as you run into 2 decent opponents with equal or greater run speed... you are very likely to be dead.
OR
you can go AGI shielder. in which case you want 7-9 shield, 7-9 athletics, and 7-9 weapon master. the shield skill does not JUST add hp to your shield. im not actually sure it does add hp at all. my understanding is that it increases the shields resistance value... which means it takes less damage per hit. with 8 shield skill your shield is very durable (and far far more so when you have a masterwork huscarl :D). as for athletics... i usually wear the gambeson, sometimes i go a bit heavier (tunic over mail) or ligher (peasant gear). regardless of what i wear, i have a huge advantage in mobility over most opponents, especially if i am in the gambeson or lighter. ask wallace how easily he keeps up in a duel... i usually dart in an out of his reach while smacking him in the head with an axe. also, with my high athletics if i find myself facing 6 opponents... im not automatically screwed. I can backpedal to safety while engaging one or two at a time, often causing them to friendly fire a lot. and lastly... weapon master... when you go high agility, you obviously go low strength... as a result... you want as much wpf as possible to make up for as much damage as you can, as well as to get all the speed increase that you can. (according to vargas melee damage calc... with 12 str, 4ps, 172 wpf, and a 40c 1 hander you would do a minimum of 17 and a max of 36 against an enemy with 40 armour.) compared to 23-43 with 21 str, 7ps and 130wpf. not that big a diff...
anyways... overall... if you want to wear lots of armour and take a beating before you go down, and if you want people to really feel any hits you land... then STR may be for you.
if you want to run around ninja-ing people, pissing off archers, outmanuevring people, and dying instantly 90% of the time you make a mistake... go AGI.
they both have their purposes. i think agi is a better team build, and more useful for manipulating enemies and distracting... but str is nice and straightforward and its easier to rake in kills when you only need to land 1-2 hits instead of 1-4
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I am really enjoying this thread.
+1 awesome point to Gorath for starting it (not that I think he will ever climb back to a positive score :D)
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the shield skill does not JUST add hp to your shield. im not actually sure it does add hp at all. my understanding is that it increases the shields resistance value...
Well according to the native mechanics the shield skill reduces the damage your shield takes by 8% per point of shield skill. So unless c-rpg changed this mechanic...
Anyways, that damage reduction is what I mean when I say it effectively adds hp to your shield. Change the word HP to durability if that helps. :)
I used to think the same as the rest of your post, which is why I always went with more of a balanced build, or an agi-focused build for my shielder if I had to have uneven stats. Figured with how much a shield slows you down that the athletics, shield and wm skills would really help. But, and not only with my shielder, my OP is what I've been noticing as the norm on the field and in duels with such str based guys as Gore and Cyran for the best examples. Both are decked out in armor FAR above the weight of my own, with agi that's less than half of mine (and skill points to match) and yet I can't see any discernable speed difference in my favor when dueling them.
Not sure how you're reaching 9 points in athletics, shield and wm though.
That'd be a:
Strength: 9
Agility: 27
Converted: 2
Power Strike: 2
Shield: 9
Athletics: 9
Weapon Master: 9
build @30.
Given the low str and only 2 PS I'd dare say the only way you're going to really kill anything is if you're running around with a masterworked top tier 1h like the side katana. And even then it seems like it's going to take you a dozen hits.
Sure it all boils down to preference and playstyle, but efficiency wise I'm just not seeing the value.
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i usually go 12/24. 4ps 1if 8shield 8ath 8wm
my current build... well i kinda fucked it. i was planning on 9/30 but changed my mind and went for 9/27... but id already traded for 2 stats... so im sitting on
10/27
3ps 9ath 9shield 6wm
i should have done
9/27
3ps 9ath 9shield 8wm
anyways. i still 1 shot people pretty often. the thing is... you cant run around slashing guys with swords and expecting to top the team. you might be ok with a masterwork sword.. but not a regular.
i do quite well in duels and battle with this build though, which is interesting because i was mostly trying it as a joke. last gen i tried 24str 15agi and did not like it at all. it drives me insane not being able to out-manoeuvre people. sure i could rake in the kills easy enough, but i found i was getting a bit lazy since i could take more hits, and i was totally screwed whenever i ran into 2 good players with more athletics than me.
its true that in a 1v1 it takes more effort to kill good players with agi build... but i manage ok. me and cyranule are pretty evenly matched. if he brings an axe he might have an advantage, but if he doesnt have an axe, i have the advantage. of course it takes me 2-6 hits to kill him, and it takes him 1-2 to kill me... but still, we are pretty even.
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me and cyranule are pretty evenly matched.
I don't doubt it. He an I are pretty even in duels as well but I'm just using him as an example for the speed differences. Do you really notice that you're that much faster than he is? Footwork wise and the speed of your shield blocks/counterattacks? As an outside view when you and I fight I'd never guess your build was what you just laid out, you really don't seem that fast at all when we're fighting. *As an aside, I assume that's the reason you're rocking the steel pick alot with that low of str and PS*