Ranperre's March 2021 Skill Power Index

[Tutenshtein]

Guys a noob request - can you also post best skill combo's in such a manner? At least approximately with no comment's, just a short list. Thanks. Or not even rank them, just what pair best with what, that sort of thing.

[Celerity]

@Tutenshtein, since we've come this far already.

Tanking:

Staff/Shield
Cow/Unarmed

Heal focused support:

Pig/Priest

Damage focused support:

Fire Magic/Battle Chemistry
Ice Magic/Battle Chemistry*

Damage:

Fire Magic/Priest
Fire Magic/Animal Handling
Archery/Animal Handling
Hammer/Animal Handling
Hammer/Archery
Giant Bat/Warden
Spirit Fox/Priest
Spirit Fox/Necromancy
Fire Magic/Ice Magic*
Fire Magic/Fairy Magic**
Hammer/Fairy Magic**

Worth noting is that fire magic gets bonus damage on almost every mob in Wintertide other than the engine area and aberrations which is why it's so strong right now. I would personally recommend switching to a different build for the engine area at least, but then since you have a different build for that you may as well also use it for aberrations too.

*Ice magic is amazing but half the "relevant" mobs in Wintertide are immune to cold. What I mean by relevant is on the path of one of the dailies, so not including cargo deck and aberrations are easy either way. It makes a great switch away from a fire magic build for the engine area + aberrations though.
**Fairy magic is also amazing but not reasonable to make builds for currently.

[cr00cy]

I'm supprised you rate Lycans so low. Granted, I havent played seriously in a long time, but my wolf doesnt feel that weak. The few times i join dungeon party, and actually bother to look at autopsy in mobs, I'm usually near the top of damage dealt, even on regular elites that get anihilated almost instantly, and I play heavy dot-focused build.

That beign siad, I never tried out new Fae Real dungeon, so i don't know how I'd fare in current end-game. I'm not gonan argue with you ont his placement, but since you said that yor ratign is based on teh fact you dont see many/any wolf palyers in end game, as wolf main, I think I migth offer a bit of insight as to why.

The thign about wolf is that it was never, to my knowledge, very popular. It migth be hours I play at, but I don't think I ever saw more than 5 or 6 wolf players at the same time, even when it was objectivly Op. First there was this time that Wolfs very literaly immortal, as long as you were willing to spend some time howling in group, becuse you would regenerate 100% of your HP every healing ticks (I think ist 5 sec? I don't think I ever saw any official information about it). Then there was combo-chain build that let you chain combo effect, dealing shitton damage and healing for like half your hp every rotation. Then there was this time when BM regen scaled with monster lv so hard that after eating worm in Ilmari Desert, you regenerated liek 80 hp every second (that was in tiem when max lv was 60, most people had like 500 max hp,a dn monster had WAY less damage than now). Then, most recent, was Skulk, that offers such obscene damage buff, that it wasn't even funny(literally. After initial amazment passed, it was really boring, at leats for me, just pressing 2 buttons to end fight.)

And, I say t again, I NEVER saw too many Wolf palyers. Even when durnign Skulk time, when I think most people agreed that Wolf is top tier dps, not many people played him. Even durnig full moon, when I joined dungeon party, I rarely saw other wolves.

I think most players just don't want to deal with whole full moon and forced transformation sheningans, and simply play 'normla classes', or other animals, since then they can just cure curse and not deal with any trouble.

[Tutenshtein]

Awesome! Thanks alot! Also what do you think would be "best" combo for solo playing? I mean to take on as much content as possible solo? I had a thought about Hammer/shield, what do you think? Or some other would be better? Im looking to have adequate protection and adequate dmg too.

[Mirromorka]

I musr replay to this , i strongly do not agree with most of this , im not trying to put u down , but the devs have thought the classes through and they did great job , so many high damage builds ur ranking shit , and thats the point to master a class u need to spend long time with it , theres an old article about my hammer necro because it was to op necro is stil insanly strong by itself , my psych ment can solo elites and u rank psyc shit , my wolf animal handling can solo fae elites so many great classes to be used in the corect way and are verry powerful in the correct usage ,

[Celerity]

Problem with shield is that most of its physical damage mitigation comes from bulwark mode which you wouldn't want to use solo because it cuts your damage by 50%. Every mob you can skin deals physical damage which is important since farming skins is a great money making method. A large amount of enemies outside of skinnable ones also deal physical damage.

For soloing every skill has "enough" damage, so it's more about aoe, movement speed and survivalability. Therefore I think fire magic/battle chemistry is the best in the game for soloing. Both skills offer movement speed, both offer aoe, bc has decent enough damage, fire magic high damage and extra skin from bc gives you great survivalability vs physical damage and dots which are honestly the most dangerous thing in the game. Bc also has heals in case you need them and the golem to restore your power and heal you too. The skills synergise with fire magic boosting the damage of your bc dots too. If you're lazy though you can go for warden/x where x can basically be anything but probably optimally unarmed or battle chemistry (bc just for extra skin). That's because of privacy field which just reflects damage on enemies and kills pretty much everything around you with you only having to recast privacy field every 30 seconds and do nothing else except keep your hp up.

That's what the "best" options are but really it's just a game so I would say play what you enjoy. You're not really ever going to struggle solo whatever skills you pick.

[Mikhaila]

Awesome! Thanks alot! Also what do you think would be "best" combo for solo playing? I mean to take on as much content as possible solo? I had a thought about Hammer/shield, what do you think? Or some other would be better? Im looking to have adequate protection and adequate dmg too.

I think that the answer here is that most people should be able to solo all the soloable content in the game, with almost all the class combos. The best combos make solo fights against normal mobs pretty easy, if you are well geared. Which is my next point:

For solo players, your character isn't just those two skills. Are you eating crap food, or did you level your gourmand? Did you level your endurance skills and use first aid etc as part of your options, or do you only think of FA when about to die? Potions? Meditation? Caligraphy?...a lot of ways to add protection when you know where you are going. What alcohol or drugs are you taking along? They have downsides but can buff up your character similar to potions. Buckle Artistry? Sigils? Shield Wax? So many little things. What is your gear like? Yellow mastercrafted with 7 mods? or just that collection of found items? Lots of things make up how tough your character is beyond those two combat skills.

[Ranperre]

I'm supprised you rate Lycans so low. Granted, I havent played seriously in a long time, but my wolf doesnt feel that weak. The few times i join dungeon party, and actually bother to look at autopsy in mobs, I'm usually near the top of damage dealt, even on regular elites that get anihilated almost instantly, and I play heavy dot-focused build.

The lack of a good aoe in addition to unarmed (natural other skill b/c of trauma) being weak in general hurts lycan. Maybe I've missed something, this was one of the skills I bowed to community opinion more than personal experience.

Awesome! Thanks alot! Also what do you think would be "best" combo for solo playing? I mean to take on as much content as possible solo? I had a thought about Hammer/shield, what do you think? Or some other would be better? Im looking to have adequate protection and adequate dmg too.

I'd recommend fire/staff to be different from Celerity (I have fire/bc), but this is something I haven't explored too much since they ruined fire/ice and elite mob hp doubled.

my psych ment can solo elites and u rank psyc shit , my wolf animal handling can solo fae elites so many great classes to be used in the corect way and are verry powerful in the correct usage ,

The focus of this rating/review is to give individual skills an objective power ranking when it comes to Wintertide and GK.

I wanted to limit it to the content I have the most experience with. Psych/ment is, indeed, bad, at least for damage. You have super high cooldowns and if you don't crit (or can't) you're effectively worthless because the non-crit damage on this stuff is really, really bad. The only thing you have going for you is doing damage to Dalvos or buffing other people in your group that might be useful. Many, many people can solo fae elites. It's an accomplishment, but not something that delineates the best builds for dungeons.

Necro is fundamentally flawed because you need to resummon your zombie every time you change floors. My group takes an hour to get through wintertide and makes five jumps, meaning six separate instances when you can keep the zombie out, 10 minutes a piece. You're looking at having a maxed out zombie out only half of the time, maybe less.

[Mikhaila]

If you're lazy though you can go for warden/x where x can basically be anything but probably optimally unarmed or battle chemistry (bc just for extra skin). That's because of privacy field which just reflects damage on enemies and kills pretty much everything around you with you only having to recast privacy field every 30 seconds and do nothing else except keep your hp up..

I'd love to mix BC with Warden, but no hands

Warden is a great farming option, agreed. The amount of damage it can put out with privacy field and the fire kills most any large mob of critters in a couple of seconds
. Warden/Unarmed is a good option, useable in any animal form.

[cr00cy]

The lack of a good aoe in addition to unarmed (natural other skill b/c of trauma) being weak in general hurts lycan. Maybe I've missed something, this was one of the skills I bowed to community opinion more than personal experience.

Why is Unarmed weak? Like I said, havent played seriously in a long time, but I don't remember Unamred being weak.

Whiel I agree that Lycna on its own may lack Aoe, but I don't think one should look at any skill in vaccum. Afterall, we are supposed to use 2 combat skills, so I think more fair comparision would be how well skill synergies with other skills.

For example, my favorit build, wolf/unamred has quite a few options for AOe. Bite and Barrage are given, but you can aslo use combso for aoe kick or cobra/mamba stike, or mod for aoe hip throw/body slam (gloves are not very mod-heavy in this build). Again, I dont know, I was never group payer, I mostly play solo, but I never felt useless in groups with my wolf.