240 réponses à ce sujet

[BansheeOwnage]

If we're fixing bugs with patches it will be in both. If we're doing balance I have the ability to make number based changes exclusively for MP side of things.

 

Hope that helps

Thanks for the info!

[Courtnehh]

I know, right?! I'll probably do more directed topics like this in the future if they continue to go well. Trying not to sway any of the feedback with my opinions on things but most of it is roughly in line with the data we're getting as well as my own personal perception of the characters.

 

 

 

Can't really comment directly on what I can and cannot change but I'll say that the easiest thing to do (especially as of the last patch) is tweak numbers on skills. SO while I couldn't easily add extra actions to an ability, I could, hypothetically, increase the damage multiplier for them

I think Cillian could do with that damage multiplier, you guys need to give the poor fella some love.

[Beerfish]

Cillians new spirit blade:

 

[Beerfish]

-Knockout Bomb- honestly, I've never even tried it... because the Alchemist has issues in the 'can kill' department, and I try to keep my skills in the realm of 'can help me kill things' rather than the 'will get broken by the three other people with me'.

 

Not sure how you can make a lengthy analysis of the alchemist and say this.  Knock out bomb is a staple of my alchemist.  That along with frost flask and shadow strike make her pretty viable and actually more survivable than the assassin imo.

[Catastrophy]

Strongest:

 

AW - I only played him to lvl 10. At that time I wasn't able to reliably solo with other characters. Within two runs this character got me farther than any other kit at that time. Stopped playing because I don't like Elves (lol, I like the Keeper, though) and the spirit blade stuff felt ridiculous. And the golden pants are silly, too.

 

Emmentalerist: That meteor focus ability - was it intended for MP? A "Fisto"-build is fun though.

 

Necro: When everything goes splotch without the others having time to kill it's borderline OP, but it's a gear thing, requires some timing and it's funny as hell.

 

Keeper: I pretend she's not an Elf, goes from boring to OP when the cage synergizes with other teammates. Crutch for platinum, but I find it fun to follow Katari and keep them barriered.

 

 

Weakest (while not "weak" those listed have certain issues, I consider a kit weak if it offers little variation in gameplay):

 

Katari not anymore - the buff helped. A lot. More fun to play now. Can take so many different skillsets and do well. Except whirlwind.

 

Hunter: Is it Hunter or Griffon Bow? I guess it's Griffon Bow. A bit like Alchemist where all abilities are all over the place. Leaping shot build is reliable but boring. Tried poison build with mild effectiveness and looked at Luka, but she was busy eating mushrooms.

 

Alchemist: I do OK on threatening, but I doubt I could take her further. Also, I can't figure out all the stuff she has in her trees. And I always confuse KO powder and bomb and how they work. I have tons of AoE daggers and no idea how they work compared to normal daggers and how they synergize with ability damage.

Wanted to try out an elixir swallower but I don't play often enough anymore and I can't remember how I thought it might work. Must be the mushrooms.

 

Templar: Has nuke, but going for chokepoint control abilities isn't worth it, imo. So I end up with the same build.

 

AW: If you do the Spirit Blade all over and over and over and over and over and over .... again it's just a weak and poor experience.

[Kalas Magnus]

I say increase the arcane warriors threat level. give him something greater than the archers.

if i run ahead let me get all the aggro. 

[Drasca]

AW: If you do the Spirit Blade all over and over and over and over and over and over .... again it's just a weak and poor experience.

 

Try builds without SB. It is more fun that way.

[yarpenthemad21]

Try builds without SB. It is more fun that way.

 

More like broken experience.

Stone fist detonation damage bug, mind blast sucks as detonator really (and skill for AW) so all this AW without SB looks more like spam CL to death.

In current state your build for non SB AW is the same as normal SB AW build which just don't use SB.  What's the point? It could work when stone fist is fixed, not now.

 

I'm also quite sure that there is a bug with weakness and applying weakness when target has it cause to immu text and other stupid things.

[nibyl]

I actually tried drasca's swordless aw and had a blast with it on threatening. Perilous remains to be seen. I guess I'm near that point where I need to gimp my classes in some way or play with a weak class for this game to be actually challenging.

 

That sounds really cocky when I read it in my head but it is what it is.

[Drasca]

More like broken experience.

Stone fist detonation damage bug, mind blast sucks as detonator really (and skill for AW) so all this AW without SB looks more like spam CL to death.

In current state your build for non SB AW is the same as normal SB AW build which just don't use SB.  What's the point? It could work when stone fist is fixed, not now.

 

I'm also quite sure that there is a bug with weakness and applying weakness when target has it cause to immu text and other stupid things.

 

I've got Perilous Dominating builds right here for AW:

 

http://forum.bioware...rite-mp-builds/

 

Some people like to trade Fade Cloak for Fade Step. Those people prefer doing less damage prefer chilling / frost stepping using their controllers, and are willing to accept killing much slower as a trade off.

 

You do need to understand the sleep combo Shock then Weakness --> Sleep however, and the use of restorative veil requiring weakness to restore mana and static charge paralyzing during casting. All things to track alongside cooldowns, spacing and Close Quarters Combat stuff.

 

There is a learning curve, but the Combo King build is more better than every other AW build out there.  Team friendly (Incapactiate Combos, Pota, Positionally stable), Exp building, time saving, etc. It is better in all ways except the initial learning curve. Only complete noobs unwilling and unable to learn, and content to SB all day won't do better. You're not one of those SB all day guys, so that doesn't apply to you. 

 

While I dislike SF's broken detonation damage, the sleep combo is still worth performing, and it appeals to me when casting SF /w Static Charge that enemies in melee range about to attack will be paralyzed as I cast SF, and then subsequently discharged and put to sleep via the same SF cast.

 

When the RTC gets in range of this build, he never wakes up except to potion (or that WW invincibility about to potion bug).

[yarpenthemad21]

I've got Perilous Dominating builds right here for AW:

 

http://forum.bioware...rite-mp-builds/

 

Some people like to trade Fade Cloak for Fade Step. Those people prefer doing less damage prefer chilling / frost stepping using their controllers, and are willing to accept killing much slower as a trade off.

 

You do need to understand the sleep combo Shock then Weakness --> Sleep however, and the use of restorative veil requiring weakness to restore mana and static charge paralyzing during casting. All things to track alongside cooldowns, spacing and Close Quarters Combat stuff.

 

There is a learning curve, but the Combo King build is more better than every other AW build out there.  Team friendly (Incapactiate Combos, Pota, Positionally stable), Exp building, time saving, etc. It is better in all ways except the initial learning curve. Only complete noobs unwilling and unable to learn, and content to SB all day won't do better. You're not one of those SB all day guys, so that doesn't apply to you. 

 

While I dislike SF's broken detonation damage, the sleep combo is still worth performing, and it appeals to me when casting SF /w Static Charge that enemies in melee range about to attack will be paralyzed as I cast SF, and then subsequently discharged and put to sleep via the same SF cast.

 

When the RTC gets in range of this build, he never wakes up except to potion (or that WW invincibility about to potion bug).

 

 

I still don't get why you treat every person here as newbie moron playing game for 2 days at most.

 

on AW, on normal "sane" build for "not strange" ppl you will use 4 skills

SB, Fade Cloak, PoTB and CL.

CL-> PotB = sleep

+ I still have SB (instead of broken stone fist) and can deal damage with it, reflect projectiles. 

I still have paralyze passive, those builds are pretty much identical with (your requires 1 skill point more). I can set on sleep, I can deal way more damage and I can reflect projectiles. 

I can change PotB for strone fist or veilstrike to have more spammable version and to set sleep on start of the fight if PotB mana cost is too high for me.

 

But whats the point really in the "sleep" combo spamming and using broken skills to get sleep combo. Keeper in basic gear can with CL and veilstrike set sleep. Alchemist with knockout bomb can set sleep, the archers also. 

Many classes has weakness, even templar and reaver. with CL user in party you would get pretty much too much sleeping targets.

 

And rtc on perilous should be for AW main target. There shouldn't be any problem with having his aggro and tanking him for the rest of the party (which either focus on him or want to milk the boss, SB helps with it because of higher damage, reflect and guard bonus damage which feel all your barrier with one strike on rtc phase change ).

 

You know what kind of ppl use fade step on AW? Egoistical ones who charge and try to kill everything on their own so the party can get even single kill.

 

 

As for the combination. Primers, setting up is way way way easier and more common. We lack detonators, not every ele use immolate (because of some insane love for fire mine), very few mages uses energy barrage. Alchemist and assassin most of the time have detonators but they choose mostly fresh targets not those stacked shocked, weakend and almost dead. Also it's single target rogue rogue combo.

Katari has at most 2 of them, most lego has either none or maybe 1, templar most of the time try to detonate their own combos. Hunter has zero, archers can set sleep and has one detonator of rogue type. 

Yes you can imagine happy world of great players who w8 for each other with their skills and detonate combos all the time. Not in my world. 90% of perilous lobbys are plain made of AW, Elementalists and Keepers. Synergy with sleep pretty much not existing, because in this type of party everything sleep all the time but outside of ele and some "not common" keeper build nobody can detonate it.

Also it need to be said that most detonators are single target ones. Rupture detonation isn't that great, it's just decent on normal mobs. Nightmare is way better but we have in this game outstanding 4 eldritch detonators.

 

I see plenty of ppl using stone fist, because ppl are just too lazy to read numbers and still thinks this detonation works. It's really annoying when you want to detonate paralyzed group or sleeping group with your katari or elementalist and some stone fist destroy everything and wasting this great situation.

So in my opinion recommending AW build with stone first is just plain bad idea.

[Proto]

Pretty fun demonstration from another players point of view. This was my first time ever messing with the no spirit blade.

 

Still think keeping spirit blade is probably better for less organized groups / players who need to carry. But, I think its safe to say all Arcane Warrior builds are viable...why does this keep getting hashed out?

 

[yarpenthemad21]

Slacking, wasting paralyze and other combos AW vs great play of necro. This is how I see it.

AW which does not aggro and take rtc on his ass is waste of spot. AW playing as poor man egoistical keeper without barrier.

[Gya]

Pretty fun demonstration from another players point of view. This was my first time ever messing with the no spirit blade.

Still think keeping spirit blade is probably better for less organized groups / players who need to carry. But, I think its safe to say all Arcane Warrior builds are viable...why does this keep getting hashed out?

Daaaayum that's some pretty sweet necro-ing! Looks like they've got pretty sweet con and/or cunning though, based on how arrows didn't do that much damage. Still, impressive stuff.

[Drasca]

I still don't get why you treat every person here as newbie moron playing game for 2 days at most.

But whats the point really in the "sleep" combo spamming and using broken skills to get sleep combo. Keeper in basic gear can with CL and veilstrike set sleep. Alchemist with knockout bomb can set sleep, the archers also.

 

If you don't explain everything for everyone for reference, then there will be incomplete information for those that don't know.

 

What's the point of sleep combo spam? Sleep breaks often from team friendly fire.

 

1) Sleep breaks within 1.5 seconds of damage

2) Other sleep combos have high cooldowns, typically with a base 20 second (KOB/KOP) -24 seconds (VS) or is conditional (opportunity knocks on Archer, and not firing, KOP requires short range)

 

SF has a base 8 second cd, which in practice shaves down to every 3-5 seconds.

 

 

There shouldn't be any problem with having his aggro and tanking him for the rest of the party (which either focus on him or want to milk the boss, SB helps with it because of higher damage, reflect and guard bonus damage which feel all your barrier with one strike on rtc phase change ).

 

Standard build will faceplant from horror spikes and knockdown. SB actually does less damage than GS staff auto-attacks vs single target. I can prove this both mathematically and in-game thunderdome style. Typically his guard is very little of his actual total damage taken, particularly if he's constantly put to sleep.

 

 

You know what kind of ppl use fade step on AW? Egoistical ones who charge and try to kill everything on their own so the party can get even single kill.

 

And those that just like FS. I admit it is a fun and useful skill. You don't have to be the most efficient, but my build *IS* the most efficient.

 

 

As for the combination. Primers, setting up is way way way easier and more common. We lack detonators, not every ele use immolate (because of some insane love for fire mine)

 

Why do you assume everyone in the party is a mage? Plenty of rogue & warrior detonators that work great with the paralyze and sleep incap's the AW produces.

 

Ele's love FM for the 5k-9k AoE damage, which makes Immolate left for noobs.

 

very few mages uses energy barrage.

 

 

And they shouldn't, because EB sucks. There's much better and reliable skills.

 

 

Achemist and assassin most of the time have detonators but they choose mostly fresh targets not those stacked shocked, weakend and almost dead

 

You've never TF/DB'ed into the middle of a sleep/paralyzed PotA mob pack, have you? Or 2H warrior mighty blow, or 1H warrior detonate. Everything dies in a glorious team combo fireworks effect.

 

 

90% of perilous lobbys are plain made of AW, Elementalists and Keepers

 

What platform do you play on? I play on Perilous PC. Depending on the time of the day and day of the week, it is either completely empty, or filled with all sorts of random classes.

 

In the mad pug rushes, you need to learn to be more aggressive, run past the single melee footsoldiers and alpha strike the bigger groups. Let the others clean up the small stuff, and go for the big prizes at advantageous positions.

 

 

Also it need to be said that most detonators are single target ones.

 

You  need to learn that Pota makes all the targets gather in one spot, and that every melee weapon and skill will hit everything within range of it, which includes multiple enemies stacked on top of each other. A TF or DB , ShB, L&Slash, etc will hit everything inside a PotA stacked group, detonating everything that's incapactated there.

 

 

to detonate paralyzed group or sleeping group with your katari

So in my opinion recommending AW build with stone first is just plain bad idea.

 

 

Sleep a group means it can no longer fire arrows of death, and can no longer block your Katari's attacks. For Reaver, it guarantees crits as Reavers should be taking Deathblow. Archers sometimes take mercy killing for guaranteed crit as well, and Assassins are almost guaranteed to have mercy killing on those sleeping targets.

 

Static Charge works with all spells, and given this build literally spams spells every few seconds, it is much more likely to paralyze than a SB based build (which is inherently not casting spells). You'll see Paralyze and Sleep much more often. 

 

Fortunately your opinion is based on misunderstanding and is outright wrong. SF /w SC generates the paralyze and sleep combos that are so valued above, and generates them often and reliably with its low cooldown, and useful knockdown & weaken debuff on enemies (which further adds party damage, by synergizing with Coup De Grace, and preventing Blocking of attacks).

 

 

I think its safe to say all Arcane Warrior builds are viable...why does this keep getting hashed out?

 

Viable and time efficient/effective are two different things. Plus people are ignorant about combat mechanics and how to use them.

[Drasca]

Pretty fun demonstration from another players point of view. This was my first time ever messing with the no spirit blade.

 

Ah fun stuff. You'll learn to play closer if you want to actually maximize your gains. Your skill order is actually wrong for maximum benefit of that build. Need to walk toward and into an enemy as you FC, Pota --> CL --> SF.

 

PotA first is valid and necessary sometimes, and you did great for a first run, but you'll see running close combat works better taking advantage of combat clarity and offensive FC synergy with Pota / Restorative veil

[Proto]

Ah fun stuff. You'll learn to play closer if you want to actually maximize your gains. Your skill order is actually wrong for maximum benefit of that build. Need to walk toward and into an enemy as you FC, Pota --> CL --> SF.

 

PotA first is valid and necessary sometimes, and you did great for a first run, but you'll see running close combat works better taking advantage of combat clarity and offensive FC synergy with Pota / Restorative veil

 

Oh, I'm sure it can be played much better than I showed. But, I think the point was made that the potential is there to make the game quite enjoyable for your teammates, even if not tanking the RTC.

 

BUT, lets not derail the thread any further? Just in case others have more input to give. (Class balance, not AW build) . 

[Catastrophy]

Thoughts 2.0

 

Strongest:

 

Ranged: They cast powers and can project Weapon damage over distance. Doesn't look like they have a handicap doing so in melee.

 

Non-AoE spells: Easy to use with PC controls

 

Weakest:

 

Melee: Can cast powers but need to get close to project weapon damage. Have fun if they have trouble doing so (see Katari 1.0)

 

AoE Spells: PitA with PC controls and long animations ruin them a lot.

 

Orlesian Castle: The Krogan head trophy is a slap in the face for real warriors. I'd like to headbutt the one putting it there. And it's NOT a friendly headbutt.

[Best of the Best]

Strongest: Whatever I play.

Weakest: Whatever you play.

[Vorna]

-Knockout Bomb- honestly, I've never even tried it... because the Alchemist has issues in the 'can kill' department, and I try to keep my skills in the realm of 'can help me kill things' rather than the 'will get broken by the three other people with me'.

 

Not sure how you can make a lengthy analysis of the alchemist and say this.  Knock out bomb is a staple of my alchemist.  That along with frost flask and shadow strike make her pretty viable and actually more survivable than the assassin imo.

 

Okay, so you can survive more easily, but what are you bringing to the table with this build? You're not bringing damage. Shadowstrike does less impressive damage than twin fangs and has dodgier targeting and was (probably still is) buggier with stealth damage and has twice the cooldown time. Shadowstrike's second tier only reduces cooldowns by 4 seconds, so it's still 4 seconds longer than twin fang's cooldown. I suspect your taking shadowstrike for the cooldown reduction, but if so, why not take flank attack? That gives you an extra stealth. An extra stealth where you can wait out cooldowns. An extra stealth every 8 seconds that doesn't rely on waiting out the stealth cooldown or actually killing anything. Yeah, your frost flask and knockout bomb won't come up 4 seconds faster, but that extra stealth will get you out of bad situations more reliably than knockout bomb. Can't put bosses to sleep, but you can quickly flank attack to get out of the way of an angry templar commander. Of course flank attack does worse damage, but if you wanted damage twin fangs is superior. 

 

Okay, so you're not bringing damage, you're bringing CC with knockout bomb and frost flask and the knockdown on shadowstrike. Except, practically every class has better cc than you. They get AoE fears and knockdowns and freezes and staggers. And they usually get these things with damage on top or other nifty bonuses (like massive guard damage), we get extra flank damage. And that is the core problem with knockout bomb and why I've never used it. Even the auto crit from mercy killing seems like a waste considering I get an auto-crit from stealth. And it's incredibly likely it gets broken by some schmuck with chain lightning or something like it before I ever get my sleep autocrits. Elemental Mines gives you staggers with damage, I'd say Toxic Cloud does too, but honestly it wipes out mooks so quickly it's hard to tell if the jittering is staggers or just jittering death throws from explosive toxin. 

 

I will admit I've always been curious if mercy killing would make every poison tick a crit if a poison is used on a sleeping target. It could be quite good with Toxic Cloud then, but I've never been curious enough to try. Toxic cloud kills mooks fast enough that I'm not sure it'd make much of a difference, and no one should be speccing poisoned weapons ever in it's current state. And considering how the game tends to hate poisons, I'm assuming it's the opposite, poison ticks aren't effected at all, just physical hits. But yes, that is an assumption.

 

If I were to build a Knockout Bomb based spec, I'd put it with stealth/twin fangs/flank attack to try to keep my damage sustainable as possible. But, why use Knockout Bomb? There are better things to put in it's place that will either do more damage or keep you alive better in bad situations. And aren't likely to be hit with a stray chain lightning from some keeper who is likely barriering the leg that doesn't need it and leaving you high and dry. Yeah, maybe if I tried it it would totally change my mind... but I've seen what happens to most sleeping mobs, I've tried sleep on other characters, and they generally don't stay sleeping for long.

 

But I will admit my sarcastic and non-explanatory Knockout Bomb critique didn't really get through what I was trying say about the skill specifically, and I must thank you for that. Rereading it did a lot to show I was critiquing in a very asinine manner, not actually stating specifics as to why I found it a problem, so I'll be specific now:

 

On Knockout Bomb:

 

-It does not have a damage component, like most other forms of CC that classes get

-It's second tier only increases damage to flank damage, which can be dodgy at best in the laggy multiplayer environment

-It can easily be broken by other classes that do not gain any benefit from hitting sleeping targets

 

That last one is the worst part. But essentially, the skill stands out for at least *looking like* one of the worst cc skills any class gets. Even knockout powder's second tier increases it's duration by 50% AND keeps the target sleeping after getting hit (meaning more autocrits with mercy killing, among other things), a bit more useful than flank damage unless that non-specified flank damage is some insanely high percentage. I believe it should have something that makes it stand out, at least to to make it look like something that isn't the sad cousin to Knockout Powder.

[TheThirdRace]

Okay, so you're not bringing damage, you're bringing CC with knockout bomb and frost flask and the knockdown on shadowstrike. Except, practically every class has better cc than you. They get AoE fears and knockdowns and freezes and staggers. And they usually get these things with damage on top or other nifty bonuses (like massive guard damage), we get extra flank damage. And that is the core problem with knockout bomb and why I've never used it. Even the auto crit from mercy killing seems like a waste considering I get an auto-crit from stealth. And it's incredibly likely it gets broken by some schmuck with chain lightning or something like it before I ever get my sleep autocrits.

...

If I were to build a Knockout Bomb based spec, I'd put it with stealth/twin fangs/flank attack to try to keep my damage sustainable as possible. But, why use Knockout Bomb? There are better things to put in it's place that will either do more damage or keep you alive better in bad situations. And aren't likely to be hit with a stray chain lightning from some keeper who is likely barriering the leg that doesn't need it and leaving you high and dry. Yeah, maybe if I tried it it would totally change my mind... but I've seen what happens to most sleeping mobs, I've tried sleep on other characters, and they generally don't stay sleeping for long.

...

But I will admit my sarcastic and non-explanatory Knockout Bomb critique didn't really get through what I was trying say about the skill specifically, and I must thank you for that. Rereading it did a lot to show I was critiquing in a very asinine manner, not actually stating specifics as to why I found it a problem, so I'll be specific now:
 
On Knockout Bomb:
 
-It does not have a damage component, like most other forms of CC that classes get
-It's second tier only increases damage to flank damage, which can be dodgy at best in the laggy multiplayer environment
-It can easily be broken by other classes that do not gain any benefit from hitting sleeping targets
 
That last one is the worst part. But essentially, the skill stands out for at least *looking like* one of the worst cc skills any class gets. Even knockout powder's second tier increases it's duration by 50% AND keeps the target sleeping after getting hit (meaning more autocrits with mercy killing, among other things), a bit more useful than flank damage unless that non-specified flank damage is some insanely high percentage. I believe it should have something that makes it stand out, at least to to make it look like something that isn't the sad cousin to Knockout Powder.

From someone who never used Knockout Bomb, you sure have a big opinion on it...

You'd be surprise to know that Stealth + Knockout Bomb + Twing Fangs + Flank Attack is about the best build I've ever seen with the Alchemist. It works wonders on Perilous and Knockout Bomb is really amazing, too bad the cooldown is so high. What you have to realize is that the Alchemist is a clone of the Assassin. You trade a great offense move for a great defense move, i.e. Hidden Blades for Knockout Bomb. There is no other skills worth a damn for the Alchemist, the flasks are bad, the poisons are bad, the mines are bad. People keep using them and they keep gimping themselves. I'll admit the Alchemist is one of the weakest class, but it's still perfectly viable for Perilous with the build I mentioned.

[Innarra]

Experience generation, when you get down to it, is what is most important about getting ahead in the game. Gaining more xp for your group is one of the the most important things to strive for beyond staying alive and getting that completion. Faster leveling, more promotions makes you exponentially stronger. There are classes that outshine some of the rest in generating bonus support xp, and several that really fall short, resulting in some classes just not being sought after. In my opinion, balancing xp gain is something that should be addressed to better balance characters.

 

Mages are by far the most easiest classes that can generate xp. I don't think any of them need a nerf, but other classes could certainly use some better ways to generate xp. I'm looking at you Assassin.

 

Here's some ideas to consider:

 

Award bonus xp to kills made with 1 shot (awarding more xp for burst damage classes like Assassin/Archer/Hunter/Reaver/Templar)

Award additional support xp for cc from rogues/warriors (sleep/stun/fear) Crowd Control is just as powerful as a block using your shield, or a barrier cast on a teammate, if not more so, it should receive the same amount.

Award bonus xp to poisoning or putting DOT on the enemy

[Alan Drifter13]

 

Can't really comment directly on what I can and cannot change but I'll say that the easiest thing to do (especially as of the last patch) is tweak numbers on skills. SO while I couldn't easily add extra actions to an ability, I could, hypothetically, increase the damage multiplier for them

 

If so many experienced players say the hunter and the alchemist are the weakest characters, and tweaking numbers on skills is the easiest thing to do, I guess we'll see a buff on elemental mines soon?

[yarpenthemad21]

If you don't explain everything for everyone for reference, then there will be incomplete information for those that don't know.
 
What's the point of sleep combo spam? Sleep breaks often from team friendly fire.
 
1) Sleep breaks within 1.5 seconds of damage
2) Other sleep combos have high cooldowns, typically with a base 20 second (KOB/KOP) -24 seconds (VS) or is conditional (opportunity knocks on Archer, and not firing, KOP requires short range)

High cooldown?
KOB on archer is instant. Always. Archer does not have problems with cooldown at all.
On other classes it's enough. If you add that reaver, keeper, templar, sometimes even katari and lego can add weakened (and as you playing AW you have CL) sleep is all over the place in random places and random enemies. This type of sleep does not matter that much. Also look for the god sake for detonators.
You don't like immolate, you don't like EB. What you have? Mind blast? Really? You have some running around adhd necro in all you matches? Rogue detonators? For sleep? It's added 1-1,5k damage. They instant kill with those skill with of without it in most cases.
Warriors you say? Mighty blow but it's rupture, sucks for damage really on normal mobs. And it's a common problem. Use it on sleeping (but standing targets) or charge at them and hit those knock downed way harder.
 
 

Standard build will faceplant from horror spikes and knockdown. SB actually does less damage than GS staff auto-attacks vs single target. I can prove this both mathematically and in-game thunderdome style. Typically his guard is very little of his actual total damage taken, particularly if he's constantly put to sleep.

Spikes can be reflected. Still tanking requires LoSing in to the spot in which PoTB can gather enemies for the SB range. Nobody tank rct on open where archers shoot at you from miles. For knockdown I have Fade Cloak.
That's why there isn't any place in this build for fade step. Every skill is needed, fade step does not help with anything it's just moving faster. Tanks don't need to move faster.
 

And those that just like FS. I admit it is a fun and useful skill. You don't have to be the most efficient, but my build *IS* the most efficient.

Lookout for your ego because you can have problem with entering doors. And you want to say that you hunter build is most efficient?
 
 

Why do you assume everyone in the party is a mage? Plenty of rogue & warrior detonators that work great with the paralyze and sleep incap's the AW produces.

Your paralyze is random. Also I don't know you can't see that my build also have it. This paralyze is short and random. Static cage is telegraphs and everyone knows how it works and where to look for some paralyze mobs. This paralyze is random. Some enemy attacks you just when you wanted to cast something. You also have 2 second for it. So this warrior, rogue or whatever need to be right next to target, need to have skill ready. It works sometimes but in normal random group if you see 2 detonations from this in whole match is wow.
 

Ele's love FM for the 5k-9k AoE damage, which makes Immolate left for noobs.

It's aoe if they at stacked. Also damage does not matter. Perilous normal mobs like shades, archers etc does not have more then 5k hp.
This 9k would be good for maybe pride demon.

Also you called damage with chaotic focus. Half of barrier to blow up single mob? On normal match mobs run all over the place, wave 5 is best example. I don't run "best group in the world" like you. Normal pug does not even get a concept of LoS and most of classes which should have CC skills don't have them.
Also try to play as fire mine ele with reaver. You want stacked targets, they just scare them and chase around map. Great synergy. That's why I prefer immolate. Sniping sleep and stun combos is effective enough. It's also instant in use, not some delayed mine.
 
 

You've never TF/DB'ed into the middle of a sleep/paralyzed PotA mob pack, have you? Or 2H warrior mighty blow, or 1H warrior detonate. Everything dies in a glorious team combo fireworks effect.

I do it all the time if I see it. But there are also many players setting frozen on targets miles away, wasting detonator on some random mob etc. Primers aren't problem, sleep, frozen, paralyze if often. Execution is way harder because second person need to be ready, in good position, with good skillset and without cooldown.
 

What platform do you play on? I play on Perilous PC. Depending on the time of the day and day of the week, it is either completely empty, or filled with all sorts of random classes.
 
In the mad pug rushes, you need to learn to be more aggressive, run past the single melee footsoldiers and alpha strike the bigger groups. Let the others clean up the small stuff, and go for the big prizes at advantageous positions.
 

You  need to learn that Pota makes all the targets gather in one spot, and that every melee weapon and skill will hit everything within range of it, which includes multiple enemies stacked on top of each other. A TF or DB , ShB, L&Slash, etc will hit everything inside a PotA stacked group, detonating everything that's incapactated there.

Yes because I'm a moron and don't know how PotB works in this game. 659 hours on dragon age and still this skill is so hard for me.
And nope. It not always set them so single target attacks like TF hit multi targets. Not always.
Also those detonation aren't that great. My TF damage on assassin is around 6k I can I one shot everything without your sleep.
As for the shield bash and L&S. Not everybody have it. Damage from rupture isn't also that great. It's dot for the god sake. Look even at shatter. Compare shatter damage on warrior vs rogue. It's 800-1k vs 3k.  
 

Sleep a group means it can no longer fire arrows of death, and can no longer block your Katari's attacks. For Reaver, it guarantees crits as Reavers should be taking Deathblow. Archers sometimes take mercy killing for guaranteed crit as well, and Assassins are almost guaranteed to have mercy killing on those sleeping targets.

My build set on sleep every PotB and some random sleep from attacks (because of 5% weaken passive). It's enough for me and I have not doubt that SB gives me more then broken SF. Even freaking damage of those skills is pretty much the same and one is spammable and one not.

Static Charge works with all spells, and given this build literally spams spells every few seconds, it is much more likely to paralyze than a SB based build (which is inherently not casting spells). You'll see Paralyze and Sleep much more often.

Static charge works on SB also, still it's random. Random paralyze for 2 seconds is good "defensive" wise, not offensive.
 

Fortunately your opinion is based on misunderstanding and is outright wrong. SF /w SC generates the paralyze and sleep combos that are so valued above, and generates them often and reliably with its low cooldown, and useful knockdown & weaken debuff on enemies (which further adds party damage, by synergizing with Coup De Grace, and preventing Blocking of attacks).
 
 
Viable and time efficient/effective are two different things. Plus people are ignorant about combat mechanics and how to use them.

Stop with this ego. "I'm the best player in universe, I'm made all builds for this game, all good builds are mine and you sucks".
My build generated paralyze as fast as yours.
My have better damage.
My can tank boss, whole groups, reflect projectile, PotB them and blow them with SB in aoe style.
Setting on sleep REMOVES weakened (weakened is changed to sleep, it's strange that you don't know it). So if you want to use those nice passives for weakened (which I have also, because aside from 2 skill those build are identical) you should AVOID setting on sleep. Your synergy is virtual. Spoiled by stupid number of promotion you feel that every build works because it works for me.
No it don't. Like taking L&S on lego. I can hit with it at most for 2k+ total with crits. It barely kills normal mobs on threatening. Perilous ones have twice as much hp, it's waste of spot there. You build around sleep which removes weakened (so passives are less effective) and best detonators (which are mages ones for sleep) are all for you "for noobs". It's poor man keeper.

From the damage perspective if party lacks detonators (so most of parties) it's sometimes better to start a fight with Potb->CL. You have in that way weakened + shocked, so greatly boosted damage for everyone. And it's way better then setting some sleep which can't be even detonated.

It's really strange that some godlike DAI gamer like you don't know this type of basic things. Really strange.

[FRZN]

As for the combination. Primers, setting up is way way way easier and more common. We lack detonators, not every ele use immolate (because of some insane love for fire mine), very few mages uses energy barrage.

I thought the only (working) mage detonators were mind blast, dispel, and energy barrage?  Does immolate actually detonate now?